Listen on * Spotify * Apple Music * Amazon Music Während Friedrich Merz in Riad und Katar wieder in die Rolle des „Außenkanzlers“ schlüpft, herrscht in Berlin politische Windstille. Doch hinter dem „Winteridyll“ an der Spree brodelt es: Landtagswahlkämpfe und aufgeschobene Reformen setzen die Koalition unter Druck. Rasmus Buchsteiner analysiert, ob die Regierung gerade wirklich arbeitet oder nur eine riskante Pause einlegt, bevor das „Reformfenster“ im Sommer endgültig zuschlägt. Im 200-Sekunden-Interview geht Juso-Chef Philipp Türmer zum Angriff auf die CDU über und warnt vor einem „Großangriff auf das soziale Sicherungssystem“. Er stellt klar, warum die SPD keinen „dänischen Weg“ einschlagen sollte, während die eigene Partei am Wochenende den Prozess zum neuen Grundsatzprogramm starten wird. ⁠Neue Recherchen von Frederik Schindler von WELT⁠ decken eine für die AfD-Chefin Alice Weidel sehr unliebsame Personalie in Bayern auf: Der Bundessprecher der Identitären Bewegung ist Mitglied der AfD. Ein direkter Bruch der Unvereinbarkeitsliste, die Weidel in Erklärungsnot bringt und die interne Machtfrage zwischen Berlin und den Landesverbänden neu entfacht. Und: ein kurzes Gespräch mit Cathrin Wilhelm von ⁠Avilus⁠ über die Anwendung von Drohnen, die vielen Deutschen so bisher unbekannt sein dürfte. Das Berlin Playbook als Podcast gibt es jeden Morgen ab 5 Uhr. Gordon Repinski und das POLITICO-Team liefern Politik zum Hören – kompakt, international, hintergründig. Für alle Hauptstadt-Profis: Der Berlin Playbook-Newsletter bietet jeden Morgen die wichtigsten Themen und Einordnungen. ⁠Jetzt kostenlos abonnieren.⁠ Mehr von Host und POLITICO Executive Editor Gordon Repinski: Instagram: ⁠@gordon.repinski⁠ | X: ⁠@GordonRepinski⁠. POLITICO Deutschland – ein Angebot der Axel Springer Deutschland GmbH Axel-Springer-Straße 65, 10888 Berlin Tel: +49 (30) 2591 0 information@axelspringer.de⁠ Sitz: Amtsgericht Berlin-Charlottenburg, HRB 196159 B USt-IdNr: DE 214 852 390 Geschäftsführer: Carolin Hulshoff Pol, Mathias Sanchez Luna

Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen hailed the support Denmark and Greenland are getting from European countries over U.S. President Donald Trump’s threats to impose new tariffs in his bid to gain control of the Arctic island. “I am pleased with the consistent messages from the rest of the continent: Europe will not be blackmailed,” Frederiksen wrote in a statement on Sunday reported by the BBC and other media. “The Kingdom of Denmark is receiving great support,” she wrote, describing how she has been in “intensive dialogue” with allies including the U.K., France and Germany. “We’re not the ones looking for conflict,” Frederiksen stated. “At the same time, it is now even clearer that this is an issue that reaches far beyond our own borders,” she added. Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson was one of Frederiksen’s colleagues stressing that European countries “will not let ourselves be blackmailed.” “This is an EU issue that affects many more countries than those now being singled out,” Kristersson said in a post on X on Saturday. Frederiksen’s comments on Sunday came after Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, and the U.K. — the eights countries targeted by Trump’s tariff threat — banded together to defend the “pre-coordinated Danish exercise” in Greenland that was cited by Trump in his Truth Social post about the new tariffs. “It poses no threat to anyone,” the capitals argued, reaffirming that they “stand in full solidarity with the Kingdom of Denmark and the people of Greenland.” The U.S. threats of tariffs “risk a dangerous downward spiral,” the countries added.

BRUSSELS — Senior EU lawmakers want the European Parliament to freeze the EU-U.S. trade deal in response to Donald Trump’s threats to take over Greenland. The deal was deeply unpopular across party lines as it was seen as overwhelmingly favoring Washington, but European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen sold it as the price of keeping Trump onside. However, Trump ratcheted up his rhetoric this week, saying “we need Greenland from the standpoint of national security,” and has repeatedly refused to rule out military intervention. As a result, MEPs from the center-left, liberal, green, and left-wing groups say the deal should be blocked. “I cannot imagine that in the current situation MEPs would vote for any trade measures benefiting the U.S.,” the Greens’ top trade lawmaker and chair of the Internal Market Committee Anna Cavazzini told POLITICO.  “We should have such a discussion, it’s inevitable,” added Brando Benifei, the Socialist lawmaker who chairs Parliament’s delegation for relations with the U.S. Under the deal, most EU exports are subject to a 15 percent U.S. tariff. To complete its side of the bargain, the EU also needs to pass legislation to abolish all tariffs on U.S. industrial goods, including the 10 percent it currently slaps on U.S. cars, and ease market access for some farm produce and seafood. “If we are to give it the green light, we need guarantees that the U.S. will stop its tariffs and its security-related threats,” said Renew’s trade heavyweight Karin Karlsbro. “The United States cannot take the EU’s support for the trade agreement for granted.”  Danish MEP Per Clausen, of The Left group, has circulated a letter among all MEPs asking them to support his call for Parliament President Roberta Metsola to freeze parliamentary work on the deal. The deadline for adding signatures is Tuesday. “If we accept this agreement while Trump is threatening the international order and making direct territorial claims against Denmark, it will be seen as rewarding his actions — and will only add fuel to the fire,” Clausen said.  The biggest political group in the Parliament, the European People’s Party (EPP), remains noncommittal. “These are separate matters,” said Željana Zovko, the group’s negotiator on the U.S. file, when asked whether the Parliament should freeze the trade deal over Greenland. The EPP’s top trade MEP, Jörgen Warborn, left the door to blocking the trade deal ajar. While the EU “must preserve” the deal as a basis for stable transatlantic trade, he said, “we are ready to act if necessary.” But the EPP lacks the numbers to pass the deal with right-wing and far-right allies alone. A united front by the Socialists, Renew and the Greens would be enough to put the agreement on ice.  The Parliament’s U.S. deal negotiators will meet on Wednesday to discuss next steps.

OTTAWA — Canada’s ambassador to the United States and its chief trade negotiator with the Trump administration said she is stepping down in the new year. “I have advised Prime Minister [Mark] Carney that I will be ending my tenure in the United States in the New Year. It has been the greatest privilege of my professional life to have served and represented Canada and Canadians during this critical period in Canada-U.S. relations,” Kirsten Hillman said in her resignation letter posted on X on Tuesday afternoon. Hillman’s departure comes after eight years in Washington, as the Carney government navigates President Donald Trump’s abrupt cancellation of bilateral trade talks in October and prepares for next year’s review of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement. Hillman, a trade lawyer and career diplomat, was a key member of the Canadian negotiating team that faced off against Trump’s first administration during the talks that led to the creation of the USMCA. “While there will never be a perfect time to leave, this is the right time to put a team in place that will see the CUSMA Review through to its conclusion,” she wrote, using the Canadian acronym for the new North American trade pact. Despite the current trade disruptions and the aftermath of navigating the Covid-19 pandemic, Hillman said her greatest accomplishment was working to secure the release of two Canadian men who spent more than 1,000 days arbitrarily imprisoned in China from 2018 to 2021. “In a relationship as deep and complex as ours, pressing and consequential issues arise almost daily,” she wrote. “Yet none was more personal to me than the hundreds of hours I spent with U.S. and Chinese counterparts working for the release of Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor.”

President Donald Trump touches down in Malaysia Sunday seeking to bolster economic ties with the region amid a high-stakes trade war with China. Missing from the agenda: finalizing the splashy trade deals he announced this summer with three of Southeast Asia’s biggest economies. The president in July touted agreements with Vietnam, Indonesia and the Philippines as the White House raced to secure as many trade deals as possible before a self-imposed deadline to raise tariffs. But beyond the celebratory social media posts, the White House provided little detail on the terms to lower U.S. duties. The three countries openly disputed some of the things Trump claimed they’d agreed to. And aside from a fact sheet on the Indonesian agreement, the administration has not released further updates in the ensuing months. Trump is not expected to announce any new progress on the negotiations in Kuala Lumpur, as talks with the three governments drag on, according to three people with knowledge of the talks, although he is poised to unveil new preliminary deals with neighboring Cambodia and Malaysia. The struggle to finalize terms with Vietnam, Indonesia and the Philippines highlights the fragile nature of the handshake agreements the White House rolled out en masse this summer, which didn’t address thorny areas of dispute. That’s particularly true when it comes to the issues that involve China, including Beijing’s use of Southeast Asian countries as a transit point to duck U.S. tariffs. The failure to resolve those issues puts Trump in a weaker position going into a make-or-break meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping, currently planned for Oct. 30. “These are very complex issues,” said Daniel Kritenbrink, who served as U.S. ambassador to Vietnam in the first Trump administration. “I’m not surprised it’s taken as much time as it has, because it’s really hard to wave a magic wand and solve these issues.” “You can agree in principle on a top line tariff rate pretty quickly, but then to actually come up with an implementation plan… that’s a much more complex piece of business,” Kritenbrink added. Chief among those issues are U.S. demands to prevent China from skirting tariffs by sending goods through other countries. Trump has already imposed a 40 percent tariff on these so-called transshipped goods — items shipped through another country in order to avoid high duties. But it’s also looking to impose new “rules of origin,” in an attempt to limit China’s practice of dodging tariffs by moving Chinese-made parts to a second country for assembly. Southeast Asian countries “have said over and over and over again, they don’t want to choose between the U.S. and China,” said Barbara Weisel, a former U.S. trade negotiator now with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “But they understand that through these reciprocal trade agreements, they could well find themselves having to choose, and directly in the crossfire of the U.S.-China trade war and at the mercy of both.” That’s particularly the case for Vietnam, which has seen explosive growth in its exports to the United States since 2017, partly as a result of the tariffs that Trump imposed on China during his first term. In response, importers shifted large amount of production to Vietnam, and, the U.S. government alleges, so did China. Still, the administration may be able to come away with some trade victories on the trip, which starts with the ASEAN Summit, a biannual meeting of the regional group’s 10 nations. A senior administration official told reporters Friday that Trump will sign a “series of economic agreements” that “will further reshape the global economic order and secure more investments that will create high paying jobs and advance the reindustrialization of America.” “This will include forward-looking and tough trade deals that will benefit American workers, exporters, farmers, small businesses and digital innovators. He will also enter into critical mineral agreements that will rapidly unlock the region’s resources to create reliable industrial supply chains to support a resilient and prosperous world economy,” said the official, who was granted anonymity per the terms of the call. U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer has been actively negotiating with Cambodia and said earlier this month that the two had made significant progress in achieving a more fair and reciprocal trade relationship and securing commitments that break down longstanding trade barriers and tariffs.” Cambodia is a relatively small trading partner with a lopsided trading relationship with the United States. Last year, U.S. companies exported just $319 million worth of goods to the country, while Cambodian suppliers exported $12.3 billion worth of textiles, agricultural goods and other products to the United States. But Trump is also expected to announce a more significant breakthrough with Malaysia, one of the United States’ largest trading partners in the region, according to two people familiar. Kritenbrink said those talks have also made progress, and the two countries could be poised to announce a trade agreement while Trump is in Kuala Lumpur. U.S. two-way trade with all the ASEAN countries totaled about $475 billion last year, compared to $582 billion with China. Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore accounted for about 80 percent of that commerce, followed by Indonesia and the Philippines. Still, China is the biggest trading partner for ASEAN as a whole, highlighting the difficult choice the Trump administration is forcing the countries to make. Two-way trade totaled $984 billion in 2024, according to the Chinese state-run Xinhua News Agency. For months, the White House implied that there would be a first mover advantage for any country that struck a trade agreement ahead of Trump’s shifting deadline for the imposing global “reciprocal” tariffs he unveiled in April. But despite being among the first to strike a framework deal with the administration this summer, the Philippines, Indonesia and Vietnam were stunned to see Trump issue virtually the same 19 to 20 percent tariff on most of Southeast Asia in August, including countries that did not offer nearly the same concessions. For Vietnam, the trouble started almost immediately after news of the trade deal hit Trump’s Truth Social page. Blindsided by both a tariff and transshipment rate that Vietnamese officials said was higher than expected, the government never formally accepted the agreement. That’s left both sides stuck in talks that are still centered on the baseline tariff rates both countries plan to impose. Negotiators haven’t yet begun discussions on transshipment — a complicated topic for Vietnam, which has become a growing manufacturing hub in the wake of Trump’s first term trade war with China. The administration has taken a two-pronged approach to transshipment. The first involves pushing countries to crack down on illegal efforts to dodge tariffs by moving products through third countries before they arrive in the U.S. But they also want to step up scrutiny of the origins of component parts used in countries’ exports — what’s known as “rules of origin” — to determine how high a tariff those goods should face. “When the President says ‘transshipment,’ I think he’s also focused, maybe primarily on foreign content, especially Chinese content,” Kritenbrink said. “That’s a much harder, trickier piece of business, both to control and to actually monitor and measure as well.” It remains unclear how restrictive the United States intends to be in either negotiating, or unilaterally imposing, new rules of origin, or how expansive its definition of transhipment will be, Weisel said. Countries in the region are also resisting U.S. requests to include “economic security” provisions in the trade agreements, which could require them to restrict exports of certain high-tech goods to the world’s second-largest economy and to limit Chinese investment in certain sectors of their economy. The ASEAN nations are “concerned about the reaction from China if they implement measures,” Weisel said, particularly after Xi warned Southeast Asian countries this year not to cooperate with the U.S. against China. A third big stumbling block as the United States pushes to wrap up individual negotiations with ASEAN countries is the rising number of U.S. national security trade investigations under Section 232 of the 1962 Trade Expansion Act, any of which could lead to new tariffs on ASEAN goods after they have finalized a reciprocal trade deal with the United States. “It would be politically very difficult for them to have accepted a bilateral deal now, only to face in coming months a new 232 that significantly impacts their exports,” Weisel said. The multiple hangups — coupled with the sheer amount of trade deals U.S. negotiators are attempting to balance — leaves it unlikely that any formalized deals will happen this trip, let alone this year. “Unfortunately, the reality continues to reflect that reaching “final” reciprocal tariff deals with most ASEAN nations is not likely to happen in 2025,” said one industry official, who was granted anonymity to discuss the sensitive negotiations. Phelim Kine and Ari Hawkins contributed to this report.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said Friday that Budapest was working on how to “circumvent” American sanctions on Russian oil and gas companies.  U.S. President Donald Trump announced Wednesday he was imposing “tremendous” new sanctions on Russia’s multinational Lukoil and its state-owned Rosneft, in the first such measures since he took office.   While the details are still being firmed up, the sanctions could force Moscow to shut off its remaining oil pipelines to Europe — and that’s bad news for Hungary, which gets the majority of its supplies from Russia.   Orbán — a longtime Trump ally — was defiant, however, claiming the “battle is not over yet,” and insisting Budapest will find ways to get around Washington’s sanctions.   “There are indeed sanctions in place against certain Russian oil companies,” he told the radio program “Good Morning Hungary.” “I started the week by consulting with MOL executives several times, and we are working on how to circumvent these sanctions,” Orbán said, referring to Hungary’s MOL energy company.   “Anyone who wants utility price reductions must defend Hungary’s right to buy oil and gas from Russia,” he added.   The Hungarian leader has previously argued that Budapest has no choice but to rely on Russia for cheap oil and gas due to its landlocked geography, insisting prices would explode for consumers otherwise.  Even as the rest of the EU has weaned off Moscow’s exports since Russian President Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in the winter of 2022, Hungary and neighboring Slovakia have remained deeply dependent on the Kremlin to keep the lights on, claiming they have no real alternatives.  That’s despite the insistence of Croatia that Zagreb could meet both Hungary and Slovakia’s energy needs with its own capabilities, including the Adria oil pipeline.

Ivo Daalder, former U.S. ambassador to NATO, is a senior fellow at Harvard University’s Belfer Center and host of the weekly podcast “World Review with Ivo Daalder.” He writes POLITICO’s From Across the Pond column. When I traveled to India last February, I found a nation enthralled by America and its newly reelected president. It was a point of national pride that Prime Minister Narendra Modi was the first foreign leader President Donald Trump welcomed to the Oval Office after his inauguration. And in contrast to opinion in Europe and elsewhere, polls showed a majority of Indians had confidence in Trump doing the right thing. While traveling around the country, I met young people who yearned for the opportunity to study at American universities and build a better future for themselves and their families. Business leaders were on the cusp of expanding exports to the world’s largest consumer market and building a stronger industrial base to compete with China, having been promised a quick trade agreement. Meanwhile, diplomats and military officers believed that mutual animosity toward China would bring the U.S. and India into a new strategic partnership.  After 25 years of steady bipartisan effort to expand America’s relationship with India, Trump’s return to power was widely viewed as the dawn of a bright future for everyone. What could possibly go wrong? A lot, it turns out.  For all the optimism about a quick trade deal and stronger bilateral ties, things began to sour quickly after Modi’s return from Washington. In late February, Indians watched as their fellow countrymen were deported by the U.S. Then, amonth later, Trump announced his “Liberation Day” tariffs — socking India with a 26 percent duty on all imports into the U.S.  But the biggest blow to the relationship came in May, after India retaliated against Pakistan for a terrorist attack that killed 26 tourists in Indian-controlled Kashmir. The fighting between the two countries escalated quickly, and by the third day, India was targeting a military base near the army division that oversees Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal. This was hardly the first time the two countries came to serious blows — they have fought four wars in 75 years. But in the meantime, both nations have developed substantial nuclear arsenals, making any military confrontation that much more dangerous. At first, the U.S. feigned little interest in the conflict, with Vice President JD Vance telling Fox News: “We’re not going to get involved in the middle of a war that’s fundamentally none of our business.” But once the fighting escalated, both Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio got on the phone to both countries, and a ceasefire was quickly concluded. Trump immediately claimed credit for engineering the end to fighting, suggesting he used trade to bring both parties to heel. “We stopped a nuclear conflict,” the U.S. leader claimed. “I think it could have been a bad nuclear war, millions of people could have been killed, so I’m very proud of that.” But while Pakistan was quick to give the White House the credit it wanted, India insisted the deal had been reached bilaterally. Those in India who long warned about entangling alignments are now having a field day, and Narendra Modi himself is talking about the critical importance of self-reliance. | Antonio Lacerda/EPA Eventually, as trade talks between India and the U.S. continued to stall over agriculture and other issues, Trump and Modi spoke on the phone in June. I have been told that during this call, the U.S. president insisted Modi publicly give him credit for ending the fighting in May, and that he invited the Indian prime minister to the White House when the Chief of Army Staff of Pakistan Asim Munir would also be visiting.  Modi wasn’t about to consider either of these requests. India has always insisted its conflict with Pakistan is a purely bilateral issue, pointing to earlier agreements between the two countries that reject outside mediation. And as prime minister, Modi could never accept the idea of meeting with the Pakistani military chief as if they were equals. This was the last call between the two leaders. Washington’s stance in the trade negotiations hardened after Modi’s rejection of Trump’s entreaties, making a deal less likely. And Trump has been insisting that a final agreement be reached between him and Modi directly. However, the Indian leader knows what the U.S. president really wants — his public assent to the idea that Trump prevented a nuclear confrontation. This background helps partly explain why Trump decided to single India out for punishment for its purchase of Russian oil not long after. In early August, as the U.S. president indicated his growing displeasure with Russia over its war in Ukraine, he declared India a “dead economy” and announced an additional 25 percent tariff on the country for importing oil from Russia. Many countries buy Russian oil and other energy products — including the U.S., which buys enriched uranium for its nuclear reactors from Russia — but only India was punished. It was a confusing decision: The U.S. has long encouraged India to buy Russian oil, provided its purchases stay below the $60 oil cap agreed by Western countries. Without Russian supplies, oil prices would spike and fuel inflation. Plus, China is a far bigger buyer of oil and gas than India, yet no tariffs or sanctions were imposed on Beijing. So, after a quarter century of building a strategic partnership with the world’s most populous economy — its second-largest democracy and soon-to-be third-largest economy — why single India out? As commentators around the world were quick to note, it makes no economic, political or strategic sense. But the damage has already been done. The enrollment of Indian students in U.S. universities is down 40 to 50 percent from last year’s record high of 300,000. Businesses are looking for other export markets, aided by new trade deals with Britain and, soon, the EU. Indian officials are strengthening relations with Moscow, and Modi traveled to China for the first time in seven years. Those in India who long warned about entangling alignments are now having a field day, and Modi himself is talking about the critical importance of self-reliance. The U.S., meanwhile, is losing a strategic partner in an important part of the world. 

President Donald Trump has no plans to delay additional tariffs on India that are set to take effect Wednesday, according to a White House official, granted anonymity to discuss the administration’s plans. The new levies — imposed, in part, to pressure Russia to end its war on Ukraine by punishing one of its largest oil buyers — will raise the country’s tariff rate to 50 percent and are likely to inflame tensions between the world’s two largest democracies. They are set to take effect despite the hope among some in Trump’s orbit that last week’s appointment of Sergio Gor to be the next ambassador to India was a sign of an improving relationship between the two countries. Syed Akbaruddin, India’s former ambassador to the United Nations, said the new levies are being seen in India as “more than a trade dispute.” “Their imposition is viewed as a blow to confidence in the India–U.S. partnership,” Akbaruddin said. “If left unchecked, these could erode two decades of strategic convergence.” The U.S. hit India with a 25 percent tariff after the two countries failed to reach an initial trade agreement this summer, and relations worsened this month after Trump signed an executive order slapping an additional 25 percent levy over the country’s purchases of Russian oil. India is the second-largest purchaser of Russian oil behind China — but the Trump administration opted not to move forward with so-called secondary sanctions on the latter country amid a broader tariff denté, which expires in November. While some proponents of the U.S.-India relationship had hoped Trump would delay the imposition of the Russian oil tariffs, the administration signaled it would make good on the threat to hike tariffs on Monday when U.S. Customs and Border Protection uploaded a draft notice with guidance for importers, clarifying its plan for the additional 25 percent tariff hike. The additional tariffs are souring a once positive relationship between the two world leaders — who have called each other friends — and come as efforts to coordinate a meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy have stalled following a recent meeting between Trump and Putin in Alaska. The Indians, meanwhile, have shown little sign of budging on their Russian oil purchases, which the government has framed as purely an economic decision. Now, India’s 50 percent tariff rate will be nearly as high as the 55 percent levy Chinese goods face. Mark Linscott, a former negotiator for the U.S. Trade Representative’s Office who was involved in negotiations with India during Trump’s first administration, described the new tariffs as “unfortunate.” “It’s hard to predict how things might unfold from here, but it’s clearly a low moment now,” Linscott said. A White House official, granted anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the relationship between the two countries, said, they “don’t think this is necessarily the end of the relationship between the two countries.” The tariff-fueled rift with India may have geopolitical implications that go beyond the U.S.-India relationship. For much of this century, U.S. presidents have sought to pull New Delhi into closer strategic ties — and pry it away from its traditional relations with Moscow — through India’s membership in the China-countering group known as the Quad, which also includes Australia, Japan and the United States. Those efforts appeared to be bearing fruit as recently as January following a meeting in Washington with top diplomats from Quad countries when India’s Foreign Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar told reporters that New Delhi was willing to nudge the grouping toward a greater defense and security focus. That initiative is likely dead as long as the Trump administration’s tariff punishment continues. The Indian embassy in Washington declined to comment, but India’s Ministry of External Affairs has previously called the tariffs “unfair, unjustified, and unreasonable,” and said that India “will take all necessary steps to protect its national interests.” In a modest concession to Washington, Indian refiners plan to trim their purchases of Russian crude in the coming weeks, according to reporting from Bloomberg. But it’s not clear if a slight reduction will move the needle for the Trump administration, and the country has no plans to sever its deep financial ties with Moscow. Still, the White House has maintained that it views the oil purchases as supporting the war in Russia, with Trump trade adviser Peter Navarro in a recent Financial Times op-ed calling it “profiteering by India’s Big Oil lobby.” Navarro has repeatedly defended the tariff hike being targeted specifically on India instead of China, pointing out that tariffs on some Chinese goods are already as high as 50 percent. India was one of the first countries to begin trade talks with the U.S., with Trump and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi agreeing during a White House meeting in February to more than double bilateral trade to $500 billion by 2030. Vice President JD Vance announced during a trip to India in April that the countries had finalized “terms of reference” for negotiations, and Trump teased for weeks in July that a trade agreement with India was close. The fact that the country did not receive one of Trump’s July tariff letters was widely seen as a good sign. That appeared to fall apart when Trump posted on Truth Social in late July “ALL THINGS NOT GOOD!” with India, especially with the country’s relationship to Russia. “Remember, while India is our friend, we have, over the years, done relatively little business with them because their Tariffs are far too high, among the highest in the World, and they have the most strenuous and obnoxious non-monetary Trade Barriers of any Country,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. The new tariffs threaten to push India closer to not only Russia but China and other members of the so-called BRICS group of emerging economies that Trump has in recent weeks railed against. Still, proponents of the U.S.-India relationship haven’t given up hope. Trump and Modi could meet at the UN General Assembly in New York next month, which could give the men a chance to hash out their differences in person. “Despite the current negative commentary in India about the bilateral relationship, I believe that the Indian government would like to try to work things out — and I think the Trump administration has the same desire,” said Kenneth Juster, who served as U.S. ambassador to India during the first Trump administration. “While the current tariffs may be in effect for several weeks, I hope that the two leaders will meet on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in late September and get the relationship back on track.” Phelim Kine and Daniel Desrochers contributed to this report.

OTTAWA — Prime Minister Mark Carney is heading to Germany to build out defense and energy ties, a move designed to buffer Canada’s economy against the tariff threats posed by U.S. President Donald Trump. “There’s a broad range of areas, from critical minerals to energy and defense and security, where we are intensifying our discussions with Germany,” Carney told reporters Friday on Parliament Hill. He said he’ll be accompanied by senior members of his Cabinet responsible for defense, trade and industry to bolster economic and security cooperation. The prime minister has said Trump’s trade agenda presents Ottawa with no choice but to build new alliances. “Canada must be looking elsewhere to expand our trade, to build our economy and to protect our sovereignty,” the prime minister said earlier this year. “Canada is ready to take a leadership role in building a coalition of like-minded countries.” To that end, Carney’s government has been on a full-court press in Europe. This week, Industry Minister Mélanie Joly and Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand were in Scandinavia. Joly was in Sweden and Finland, while Anand met with Canada’s Nordic 5 NATO allies in Finland. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz will welcome Carney in Berlin Tuesday morning. Canadian Defense Minister David McGuinty is scheduled to meet with his counterpart, Defense Minister Boris Pistorius. Natural Resources Minister Tim Hodgson will do the rounds in Berlin, meeting with CEOs and executives from energy, manufacturing and defense companies. He’ll also deliver a speech to a business crowd at the Canadian embassy. “It’s really a trade mission focused on energy and critical minerals,” said a government official with knowledge of Hodgson’s plans, and who was granted anonymity to speak about them. Germany is “one of the priority markets” in the EU because it is the continent’s largest economy, the official noted. Germany is interested in Canada’s rare earth minerals to support clean energy technology and electric vehicles. It also needs to power its buildout of military hardware as a NATO member striving to meet the alliance’s new 5 percent of GDP spending target, said the official. Germany is still weaning itself off Russian gas. Hodgson will also be following up on the 2022 Canada-Germany Hydrogen Alliance that set the ambitious goal of beginning transatlantic deliveries this year. “We’ve been working very hard with them for the last several years on a transatlantic hydrogen corridor,” the official said, but added no further details. Germany also wants to secure new sources of critical minerals to counter China’s domination and weaponization of the global market. “Canada has a lot to bring to the world stage, but that also requires catalyzing investment,” the official said. “We are open to German investment in Canadian projects, if those will help get projects off the ground.” Carney said he looked forward to talking to Merz after hosting him at the G7 in Alberta earlier this year, building on Canada’s larger trade deal with the European Union. Ukraine will also be on their agenda, as it is in all conversations Carney is having with foreign leaders these days, including on what Canada’s future role might be. “I have had conversations about this, including with President Trump, in the last few weeks. We are making progress,” he said, calling it a “delicate” question. Trump said Friday that he wants “to be very good” to Canada. “I like Carney a lot,” he said in the Oval Office. “I think he’s a good person.”

President Donald Trump this week again extended a deadline for levying tariffs on dozens of countries until the end of the month. This time, the president’s allies insist he means it. Between the president’s growing impatience with the plodding pace foreign governments are taking and a broader fear about the Wall Street TACO meme suggesting “Trump Always Chickens Out,” Trump insiders privately maintain that it would make little sense — politically or from a policy standpoint — for the president to offer any additional grace, according to four people familiar with those internal discussions, granted anonymity to discuss them. “On Aug. 1, it’s all kicking in,” said Steve Bannon, former White House chief strategist during the first Trump administration. “I’m sure he’s told [Treasury Secretary] Scott [Bessent], ‘There’s no more TACO.’” Many foreign officials are taking the deadline equally seriously, according to four other people with knowledge of foreign governments’ views of the deadline, granted anonymity to discuss them. Countries have little choice but to take Trump at his word, looking to appease the president in order to avoid the global economic turmoil that could ensue if he follows through on his many tariff threats — particularly after his April 2 plan rattled world markets and his hefty tariff rates on China in May sent a shock through the supply chain. While holding firm to the newest deadline could bring the latest phase of tariff discussions to a close, it’s unlikely to be the conclusion to the administration’s trade saga, with industry-specific tariffs on the horizon. Trump is also apt to use tariffs as leverage for everything from getting governments to increase defense spending to having them abandon legislation he considers harmful to U.S. interests. The president on Monday signed an executive order delaying steep tariff rates from taking effect on nearly 60 trading partners — from July 9 to Aug. 1. The three-week extension gives the administration time to finalize framework agreements with trading partners that are close to the finish line, including India and the European Union, while pressuring others, like Japan and South Korea. It was the president’s idea to extend the deadline for the trade talks, according to three of the four people familiar, although a White House official said he consulted top lieutenants, including Bessent, in making his decision. “Bessent is a financial guy. Financial guys are interested in closing deals,” said one of the four people familiar. “And so Bessent liked the strategy the president himself came up with because he thought it was going to help them achieve the goal.” Trump’s impatience is decades in the making. Since the 1980s, he has fumed about other countries taking advantage of the U.S. on trade, and reciprocal tariffs, as he calls them, were a way to settle the score. But after three months of negotiating, his administration has little to show for its efforts: The U.S. has reached a deal with the U.K., but Vietnam has yet to formally accept a key part of an agreement the U.S. says it has reached with the country; and the U.S.’s “deal” with China is only a framework to continue trade talks. “If there’s two issues that define Donald Trump, it’s immigration and tariffs … With respect to tariffs, it’s all simple. It comes down to simple fairness — that the United States is the greatest market to have access to, and there’s a sense that we are giving away complete and unfettered access,” said Sean Spicer, who served as press secretary during Trump’s first term. “What I think largely is misunderstood is people focus on deadlines and dates as opposed to results.” Still, substantive trade deals are at odds with Trump’s effort to erect a tariff wall around the U.S. that will lure back domestic manufacturing and boost revenue. And any deal to significantly lower another country’s trade barriers may require concessions from the U.S. so both countries can sell the deals to their constituents as a win. But the president’s use of tariffs as a cudgel has forced countries to the table, even those that were originally resistant to making concessions. After months of talks with the U.S., the European Union is finally dropping plans to levy a tax on digital companies, an important win for the U.S. and a concession that may give the EU a boost as it enters the final stretch of trade talks. The bloc is confident that it will achieve an agreement ahead of the Aug. 1 deadline. “I think we will have some framework agreement before [Aug. 1],” said an E.U. official, granted anonymity to discuss sensitive negotiations said. The extension also offers time for countries to finalize deals with the Trump administration. Trade talks with South Korea were, for instance, were delayed because of the country’s election, and the additional three weeks may give the two countries time to finalize a framework agreement. The U.S. in a recent letter put Canada on a similar timeline as countries facing reciprocal tariff rates, a decision Canadian officials were happy with, even as the U.S. threatened to bump the tariff rate on the country to 35 percent. Still, the chaotic rollout of his tariffs over the past four months — and Trump’s wielding of tariff rates as bargaining chips rather than policy positions — has some trading partners skeptical that Aug. 1 is a hard deadline. They suspect he will backpedal over concerns about the market-roiling effects of higher tariffs and the threat they’ll pose to his administration’s efforts to temper inflation. “Rather than the tariffs actually being imposed Aug. 1, the U.S. will come up with another excuse and postpone again,” predicted a Washington-based diplomat granted anonymity due to the sensitivity of their comments. The daunting bureaucratic challenges the administration faces to ink bilateral trade agreements with so many countries at once is also fuelling doubts that the latest deadline will hold. “There’s just not enough time for the negotiations and it’s also extremely difficult to come up with deals that satisfy Trump without sacrificing our own economy,” said a foreign official granted anonymity because they weren’t authorized to speak on the record. As part of the talks over reciprocal tariffs, Trump wants countries to adopt anti-China provisions that could provoke Beijing to retaliate. But those countries also worry that Trump could give China a better deal in talks with Beijing, which face an Aug. 12 deadline, leaving them at a competitive disadvantage. “It’s very hard to kind of walk through all this and to navigate and to figure out how it’s all going to come together and how these different pieces are going to impact you,” said Wendy Cutler, a former senior U.S. trade negotiator, said during a discussion on Friday hosted by the Washington International Trade Association, a group for trade policy professionals. Ari Hawkins and Doug Palmer contributed to this report.