The United States has struck a framework trade deal with Europe, imposing a 15 per cent U.S. import tariff on most EU goods and averting a spiralling row between two allies who account for almost a third of global trade.
The announcement came after European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen travelled for talks with U.S. President Donald Trump at his golf course in western Scotland to push a hard-fought deal over the line.
“I think this is the biggest deal ever made,” Trump told reporters after an hour-long meeting with von der Leyen, who said the 15 per cent tariff applied “across the board.”
“We have a trade deal between the two largest economies in the world, and it’s a big deal,” she said. “It will bring stability. It will bring predictability.”
The deal also includes $600 billion US of EU investments in the United States and significant EU purchases of U.S. energy and military equipment.
The White House released the formula used to calculate Trump’s ‘Liberation Day’ tariffs. Andrew Chang explains why the math doesn’t add up. Then, Trump says he’s ‘not joking’ about potentially running for a third term in office — can he do it?
However, the baseline tariff of 15 per cent could be seen by many in Europe as a poor outcome compared to the initial European ambition of a zero-for-zero tariff deal, although it is better than the threatened 30 per cent rate.
The deal mirrors parts of the framework agreement the United States clinched with Japan last week.
“We are agreeing that the tariff … for automobiles and everything else will be a straight-across tariff of 15 per cent,” Trump said. However, the 15 per cent baseline rate would not apply to steel and aluminum, for which a 50 per cent tariff would remain in place.
Trump, who is seeking to reorder the global economy and reduce decades-old U.S. trade deficits, has so far reeled in agreements with Britain, Japan, Indonesia and Vietnam, although his administration has failed to deliver on a promise of “90 deals in 90 days.”
He has periodically railed against the European Union, saying it was “formed to screw the United States” on trade.
Arriving in Scotland, Trump said that the EU wanted “to make a deal very badly” and said, as he met von der Leyen, that Europe had been “very unfair to the United States.”
His main bugbear is the U.S. merchandise trade deficit with the EU, which in 2024 reached $235 billion US, according to U.S. Census Bureau data. The EU points to the U.S. surplus in services, which it says partially redresses the balance. Trump also talked on Sunday about the “hundreds of billions of dollars” that tariffs were bringing in.
On July 12, Trump threatened to apply a 30 per cent tariff on imports from the EU starting Aug. 1, after weeks of negotiations with the major U.S. trading partners failed to reach a comprehensive trade deal.
The EU had prepared counter-tariffs on 93 billion euros ($150 billion Cdn) of U.S. goods in the event there was no deal and Trump pressed ahead with 30 per cent tariffs.
Some member states had also pushed for the bloc to use its most powerful trade weapon, the anti-coercion instrument, to target U.S. services in the event of a no-deal.
