, Columnist
Trump's Knee-Jerk Tariffs Will Have Unintended Consequences
The measures would hurt hundreds of sectors to protect just steel and aluminum.
Farewell, TPP.
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It makes sense to ask why the Trump administration was given almost a year to decide whether aluminum and steel imports were threats to national security, yet it took only 90 days for the president to act on that decision. But three months was ample time to peruse or even skim through some of the hundreds of pages on global trade to come to a constructive conclusion.
Apparently, President Donald Trump couldn’t be bothered. Instead, on March 1, well before the mid-April deadline, he jumped the gun, tossing out a rash and unexpected decision that was even more severe than any of the three aggressive options offered by Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross.