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Trump says he will impose trade tariffs on Canada and Mexico on Saturday
Good morning and welcome to our live coverage of the latest from US politics and Donald Trump’s second week in office.
First up, the US president has repeated his threat to impose tariffs on imports from Canada and Mexico, saying they will be introduced on Saturday.
Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office, he said the tariffs would begin at 25% and “may or may not rise with time”.
He also repeated threats to impose new tariffs on goods from China, citing its role in the fentanyl trade, and on the Brics countries.
Stay with us for more on that and all the day’s developments.
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As well as threatening to introduce tariffs on Canada, Mexico, and China, as we reported earlier, President Trump has said he will impose 100% tariffs on the BRICS countries if they attempt to replace the US dollar as the dominant reserve currency.
The BRICS is made up of Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa as well as recent entrants Egypt, Ethiopia, Indonesia, Iran, and the UAE.
While the dollar remains by far the world’s primary reserve currency, the past few years have seen discussions among BRICS members about increasing the amount of trade done using their national currencies, or even the possibility of establishing a common currency.
“We are going to require a commitment from these seemingly hostile Countries that they will neither create a new BRICS Currency, nor back any other Currency to replace the mighty U.S. Dollar or, they will face 100% Tariffs,” Trump said in a post on social media.
“There is no chance that BRICS will replace the U.S. Dollar in International Trade, or anywhere else, and any Country that tries should say hello to Tariffs, and goodbye to America!”
Yesterday saw Donald Trump’s controversial nominee to head the Department of Health and Human Services, Robert F Kennedy Jr, grilled about his views at a Senate confirmation hearing.
Watch independent senator Bernie Sanders ask Kennedy whether he believes discredited claims about a link between vaccines and autism.
US national to be released by Hamas
A US national is among three hostages set to be released by Hamas under the terms of the ceasefire deal with Israel.
In a post to Telegram on Friday, Abu Obeida, a spokesperson for Hamas’s armed wing, said Israeli-American Keith Siegel would be freed on Saturday alongside Yarden Bibas and Ofer Kalderon.
Siegal, 65, was taken hostage with his wife, Aviva, and was seen in a video released by Hamas last year.
His wife was released in the first hostage-for-prisoner exchange in November 2023.
You can follow all the latest on the latest exchanges on our Middle East live blog.
Trump’s comments on tariffs also covered China, who he accused of helping to fuel the opioid crisis in the US via imports of fentanyl.
“With China I’m also thinking about something because they’re sending fentanyl into our country and because of that they’re causing us hundreds of thousands of deaths,” he said.
“China is going to end up paying a tariff also for that and we’re in the process of doing that. We’ll make a determination on what it’s going to be, but China has to stop sending fentanyl into our country and killing our people.”
Trump has threatened to introduce a 10% tariff on all Chinese goods, having imposed tariffs on around $370bn (£298bn) worth of Chinese imports during his first term as president.
Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid that is significantly more powerful then heroin. It has legitimate medical uses for pain management, but is also used recreationally.
In 2020, the US Drug Enforcement Administration said China was the “primary source of fentanyl and fentanyl-related substances trafficked through international mail”.
Here’s more on those comments from Donald Trump threatening to impose 25% tariffs on imports from Mexico and Canada, two of the US’s largest trading partners.
He said he was making the threat “for a number of reasons” but that he wants both countries to do more to secure their borders to reduce illegal migration and the flow of fentanyl into the US.
Asked whether oil imports would be excluded from the tariffs, he said “we may or may not”, adding that it would depend on prices and whether the two countries “treat us properly”.
Canada and Mexico are the top two sources of US oil imports, accounting for 52% and 11% respectively in 2023, according to data from the US Department of Energy.
Trump says he will impose trade tariffs on Canada and Mexico on Saturday
Good morning and welcome to our live coverage of the latest from US politics and Donald Trump’s second week in office.
First up, the US president has repeated his threat to impose tariffs on imports from Canada and Mexico, saying they will be introduced on Saturday.
Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office, he said the tariffs would begin at 25% and “may or may not rise with time”.
He also repeated threats to impose new tariffs on goods from China, citing its role in the fentanyl trade, and on the Brics countries.
Stay with us for more on that and all the day’s developments.
