With an unpredictable Trump, US and EU find it hard to bridge differences
The latest deals between US President Donald Trump and visiting European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker might be the first step to ease transatlantic trade conflicts, but they failed to resolve substantial differences, US experts said.
At a joint press briefing after their meeting that lasted over an hour, Trump and Juncker told media that the two sides had agreed to work together toward “zero tariffs, zero non-tariff barriers, and zero subsidies on non-auto industrial goods.”
They also vowed to work to increase trade in services, chemicals, pharmaceuticals, medical products, as well as soybeans, and Brussels planned to import more liquefied natural gas from the United States.
Meanwhile, the two sides agreed to launch a close dialogue on standards, in order to ease trade, reduce bureaucratic obstacles, and immediately set up a working group to “identify short-term measures to facilitate commercial exchanges and assess existing tariff measures and what we can do about that to the betterment of both,” Trump said.
While some US experts saw the initiatives announced by Trump and Juncker as encouraging, they believe that substantial differences remained and doubted whether the deals will really be implemented.
Tori Whiting, a trade economist at Heritage Foundation, said, “The announcements today ... were an encouraging first step to put the brakes on the trade war.”
Despite the stated initiatives, however, the two sides have so far failed to substantially patch up over US tariffs on the EU’s cars, steel and aluminum.
“The White House should immediately follow up on its promises to eliminate tariffs on steel and aluminum from the EU and work to establish similar deals with other allies. The President should also suspend the national security investigation into automobile imports,” said Whiting.
Besides trade barbs, the two sides have also been overshadowed by differences on the Iran nuke deal, the Paris climate accord, the status of Jerusalem and the share of defense spending, among others.
Trump’s relations with Russia have also fueled mistrust in Europe.
Darrell West, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, told Xinhua that “there are substantial differences between the US and European Union and this meeting has not changed those things.”
“Trump is critical of our European allies and feels they are not paying enough for national security. He is uninterested in free trade, climate change, negotiating with Iran, or standing up to Russia,” he said.
“It is going to be very difficult if not impossible to bridge that gap,” he said.
Noting that Trump’s rhetoric and moves will complicate the trend of transatlantic relations, the expert said that “it will be difficult for European leaders to sell Trump’s ideas to their voters and most of them aren’t interested in following Trump’s lead.”
“The most likely outcome is the leaders agreeing to disagree on several major issues. That is something that has rarely happened in the past but has become commonplace during the Trump administration,” he added.