The Art of the Retreat: Trump Delays Tariffs Again

July 11, 2025 1

The tariffs were due today. Now they’re due Aug. 1. Unless they’re not.

President Donald Trump this week dressed up a retreat in his trade war – delaying the imposition of tariffs from today to Aug. 1 – as a counterattack. He sent letters to 20 countries including Japan and South Korea threatening steep duties if they have not made a deal by the new deadline.

What’s he doing? Is he fulfilling Wall Street’s derogatory TACO (“Trump Always Chickens Out”) label for his strategy? Or is he back to being the president who, on April 2, tried to reorder the international trade system by imposing punishing tariffs on…basically the rest of the world.

(Editorial note: I hate TACO with the fire of a thousand suns. It’s glib and it’s wrong. Look at China, arguably the most important American trading partner. For all the talk of a “truce,” the average U.S. tariff rate on the Asian giant’s goods is 51.1%, while Beijing’s average duties on American goods is about 32.6%, according to Reuters. That’s a trade war.)

Here are four things to watch in Trump’s global trade war:

The (Re)Retreat

Trump imposed his “Liberation Day” tariffs on April 2. Markets tanked. On April 9, he announced a 90-day delay in applying them, but said they’d snap into place in the absence of new deals. That new deadline was July 9.

Two days before that deadline, and with nary a formal trade deal in hand, Trump signed an executive order delaying those tariffs again, this time to Aug. 1. But he also sent letters to 14 countries warning of tariff rates roughly in line with the “Liberation Day” levels if they don’t have deals in hand by then. Six more letters followed today.

The recipients included Japan and South Korea – America’s most important allies in Asia and pivotal players in Trump’s efforts to roll back Chinese influence.
It was not a perfectly executed move. The first letter to Zeljka Cvijanovic, Chairwoman of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina, was addressed to “Mr. President.”

The Deadline-Uncertainty Carnival

The only certainty about Trump’s trade policy is that uncertainty dominates.

So a few hours after sending his threatening letters, Trump was asked how firm the new Aug. 1 deadline is.

“Firm, but not 100% firm,” he replied. “If they call up and they say, ‘We’d like to do something a different way,’ we’re going to be open to that. But essentially, that’s the way it is right now.”

A day later, though, he posted an altogether different message on social media: “TARIFFS WILL START BEING PAID ON AUGUST 1, 2025. There has been no change to this date, and there will be no change. In other words, all money will be due and payable starting AUGUST 1, 2025 – No extensions will be granted. Thank you for your attention to this matter!”

Trump’s deadlines are firm until they aren’t. On April 7, two days before his first climbdown, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick told CNN, “I don’t think there’s any chance that President Trump is going to back off his tariffs. This is the reordering of global trade.”

‘Ask’ Uncertainty

Foreign officials have regularly said they aren’t sure what the United States wants in trade negotiations, making deals elusive.

Here’s how Kimlong Chheng, a member of Cambodia’s Trade Policy Advisory Board, put it to the Washington Post after the country got its letter:

“To be honest, there have not been clear guidelines from the Trump administration on what the Cambodian government can do to achieve an improved tariff rate. What does the Trump administration really want? We don’t know.”

South Korea’s president referenced a similar issue last week.

Crushing Congress

As is often the case with Trump, the international trade war also raises questions about the limits of presidential power.

The Constitution gives Congress, not the president, the power to set or remove tariffs. South Korea is one of 20 countries with a free trade agreement with the United States, ratified by the U.S. Congress in late 2011.

Trump has claimed that power for his own, saying trade deficits pose a national security threat under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act. This raises the question of whether any president can declare anything an emergency and abrogate a law – or in this case a treaty.

Other Countries Have Politics, Too

Shocker, I know. But other countries have self-interests and voters, and how those voters feel about the United States can constrain what their leaders do. Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney’s longshot political fortunes turned around in part because of Trump’s contemptuous rhetoric about our northern neighbor.

So one of the things to watch is the trade war’s impact on Japan’s parliamentary election on June 20. It could decide Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba’s future.

How’s it playing?

“It’s extremely rude to send only a letter to an allied nation. I strongly resent it,” Itsunori Onodera, policy chief for Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party, said at a party meeting to discuss the U.S. tariffs. “It’s unacceptable.”

That doesn’t put a deal out of reach. But it incentivizes Japanese resistance.

Source: https://www.usnews.com/news/u-s-news-decision-points/articles/2025-07-09/the-art-of-the-retreat-trump-delays-tariffs-again

Written by: Joshua Stuart

Rate it