Trump and von der Leyen announce US-EU trade deal

Washington: Donald Trump has announced a deal with the EU to end four months of difficult negotiations between Washington and Brussels and avert a damaging transatlantic trade war, imposing a 15% import tariff on most EU goods – half the threatened rate.The European Commission chief, Ursula von der Leyen, said “we have a deal” after a 40-minute meeting with Trump at his Turnberry golf resort in Scotland where the US president is on holiday for the weekend.She described it as “a big deal, a huge deal” that would bring “stability” and “predictability” to both sides.. “The two biggest economies should have a good trade flow,” she said.“It solves a lot of stuff and was a great decision,” said Trump, describing the agreement, which also involved the EU agreeing to spend tens of billions of dollars more on US energy products, as “a powerful deal” and an “important” partnership.“This is this is really the biggest trading partnership in the world, so we should give it a shot,” he had said before the private meeting started.Keeping the EU delegation, who had flown in on Sunday for the meeting, on tenterhooks to the end, the US president had repeated less than an hour earlier that the chances of a deal were only a “50-50”, and that “three or four sticking points” remained.Von der Leyen said the meeting was “tough” and “very difficult”. Referring to a pre-meeting with Trump in front of the cameras, she later told reporters at Glasgow airport: “You saw the tension at the beginning. So we had to work hard to come to a common position.”Under the agreement, the US will levy a 15% baseline tariff for most EU exports to the US, limiting a higher tariff. However, the rate is higher than before Trump came to power, and a 50% tariff remains on steel exports – a setback for that industry.There was initial confusion over pharmaceuticals after Trump said the sector would not be included.Speaking to reporters at Prestwick airport in Glasgow a short time later, von der Leyen said they were included but there were no guarantees of later increases in import duties.“It is agreed that we have 15% for pharmaceuticals. Whatever the decisions later on is of the president of the United States: how to deal with pharmaceuticals in general? Globally, that’s on a different sheet of paper,” she said.She also revealed zero tariffs will apply to a range of other sectors including “all aircraft and component parts, certain chemicals, certain generics, semiconductor equipment, certain agricultural products, natural resources and critical raw materials”.German Chancellor Friedrich Merz welcomed the deal, saying it averted a trade conflict that would have hit Germany’s export-driven economy and its large auto sector hard. German carmakers VW, Mercedes and BMW were some of the hardest hit by the 27.5% US tariff on car and parts imports now in place.Italy’s prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, said it was “positive” that a trade deal had been reached but added that she needed to see the details. Italy is one of the biggest European exporters to the US, with a trade surplus of more than €40bn.In a statement, Meloni said the agreement “ensures stability”.Under the terms of the deal, Brussels will agree to buy, over three years, $750bn (£560bn) worth of oil, gas, nuclear fuel and semi-conductors, including liquified gas, while at the same time agreeing to invest $600bn (£446bn) in the US, a deal that includes purchases of military equipment.However, Trump retains the ability to increase the tariffs in the future if European countries do not live up to their investment commitments, a senior US administration official told reporters on Sunday evening.The deal stabilises the €1.4tn trade between the EU and the US and avoids a 30% tariff rate Trump threatened to impose on 1 August if talks had collapsed.