WASHINGTON—Just 72 days after taking office, President Donald Trump announced on April 2 sweeping trade policy changes, introducing what he called “reciprocal tariffs” for all countries and declaring it “Liberation Day in America.”

For decades, the United States has kept low trade barriers, promoting free trade agreements with minimal or zero tariffs—at least on its part. Those days are now over.

​​At a White House event, Trump presented a large chart outlining baseline and reciprocal tariff rates trading partners now face in attempts to balance their high trade barriers against U.S. goods. The rates include a flat 10 percent levy, along with additional rates tailored to match each nation’s trade barriers on America.

“Foreign nations will finally be asked to pay for the privilege of access to our market—the biggest market in the world,” Trump said.

The president implemented the latest trade measures as he declared a national emergency under the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act, a law that grants the president authority to regulate imports.

The White House announced that the new tariff rates shown in the president’s chart for each country consist of the 10 percent baseline tariff and additional reciprocal levies. These new tariffs will be applied on top of any other existing tariffs.

The additional reciprocal rates will take effect on April 9 at 12:01 a.m.

“We’re kind people, very kind,” Trump said, noting that the United States will only impose half the reciprocal tariff rate that each trade partner nation has been charging.

“I call this kind reciprocal. This is not full reciprocal.”

According to the list, many of the United States’ top trading partners will now be subject to significant tariffs, including the European Union (20 percent), Japan (24 percent), Taiwan (32 percent), and South Korea (25 percent).

Cambodia will face one of the highest rates of 49 percent. Vietnam will be hit with a 46 percent reciprocal levy, and India a 34 percent reciprocal tariff, on top of the baseline levy.

The president imposed a 34 percent reciprocal tax on China. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent confirmed to Bloomberg Television that the 34 percent is on top of existing tariffs, bringing China’s total tariffs to 54 percent.

Bessent pointed to various actions instituted by foreign governments, such as currency manipulation, value-added taxes (VATs), and “non-market policies.”

A White House fact sheet outlined many instances of non-tariff barriers.

India, for example, has established duplicative testing and certification requirements in different sectors “that make it difficult or costly for American companies to sell their products in India.” If these barriers were dismantled, U.S. exports would grow by at least $5.3 billion per year.

Officials say countries such as China, Germany, Japan, and South Korea have implemented policies—regressive tax systems and low penalties for environmental degradation—that “suppress the domestic consumption power of their own citizens.” This, the document states, also enhances the competitiveness of their exports.

The White House clarified that presidential action under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962 on specific goods, such as automobiles, car parts, and aluminum, will not be subject to reciprocal tariffs. These products will instead fall under their specific tariff regimes.

The president is poised to introduce Section 232 actions on copper, lumber, pharmaceuticals, and semiconductors soon, senior administration officials noted. Critical minerals could also be part of this tariff regime.

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The United States had the highest trade deficit with China last year, totaling nearly $300 billion. For years, the ruling Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP’s) unfair trade practices, including forced technology transfers, intellectual property theft, and state subsidies, have been criticized by both political parties for threatening American businesses and workers. Additionally, China has been accused of flooding global markets with artificially low-priced exports.

After taking office, Trump imposed a 20 percent tariff on all goods made in China, citing a national emergency related to the ongoing trafficking of fentanyl. To this day, China remains the primary source of fentanyl precursors, which are shipped to Mexico and Canada, where they are processed into the illicit drug and smuggled into the United States.

China will now face U.S. tariffs totaling 54 percent, including the 34 percent reciprocal tariff, bringing it close to the 60 percent rate that Trump threatened Beijing with during his campaign.

“American people are paying a very big price,” Trump said during his Rose Garden speech on April 2, noting that China has taken “tremendous advantage” of the United States for years.

A White House official told reporters during a call that China uses transshipping to circumvent tariffs, achieving this by using third-party countries including Cambodia, Indonesia, Thailand, and Vietnam.

“The problem with Vietnam is not their tariffs,” the official said. “The problem is everything else they do, including setting up shop for communist China to send us things.”

​​While other countries may yield, China is expected to resist Trump’s new tariff policies, according to Frank Xie, business professor at the University of South Carolina Aiken.

The original 25 percent tariff on goods from Canada and Mexico, imposed due to concerns over illegal migration and fentanyl trafficking, will remain in effect. The Trump administration had previously granted exemptions for cars and other goods compliant with the U.S.–Mexico–Canada Agreement (USMCA), but these exemptions expire on April 2, and no extension has been announced.

“At this time, Canada and Mexico, they continue to be subject to the national emergency related to fentanyl and migration, and that tariff regime will persist while those conditions persist, and they will be subject to that regime, and not the new regimes,” one official told reporters before Trump’s announcement.

The current exemptions for goods covered by the USMCA free trade deal, implemented on March 6, also remain. Canada also previously received a reduced 10 percent tariff on its energy exports, which remains unchanged.

If the fentanyl and border security tariffs are terminated due to a sufficient response from either Canada or Mexico, the two nations will then be integrated into the new tariff regime, the official said.

“For decades, our country has been looted, pillaged, raped and plundered by nations near and far, both friend and foe alike,” Trump said at the White House Rose Garden event, which was attended by many Republican lawmakers and most of his Cabinet.

“Foreign cheaters have ransacked our factories, and foreign scavengers have torn apart our once beautiful American dream.”

The new measures will help reshore U.S. manufacturing, an industry that has been decimated since the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), Trump said.

“Five million manufacturing jobs were lost while racking up trade deficits of $19 trillion,” he stated. “That was the worst trade deal ever made as a result of these gigantic losses.”

The decades-long trade deficit was also cited as a reason for the tariffs. The trade gap—when a nation imports more goods and services from other nations than it exports—reached a record $1.2 trillion last year.

“Chronic trade deficits are no longer merely an economic problem,” Trump said. “They’re a national emergency that threatens our security and our very way of life.”

As to whether countries can negotiate out of the new tariffs, senior administration officials told reporters that “this is not a negotiation.”

“It’s a national emergency,” the official said. “And any country that thinks that they can simply make an announcement promising to lower some tariffs is ignoring the big, central problem of the massive non-tariff barriers and the institutionalization in their trade model to cheat America.”

If countries retaliate, the president has the flexibility to respond to ensure that these efforts are not undermined.

William Lee, chief economist at the Milken Institute, a California-based economic think tank, says that Trump’s “kind” approach, which sets reciprocal tariff rates at half of what other countries charge, is meant to make negotiations easier.

If other countries retaliate, Trump has the option to respond with higher tariffs, Lee told The Epoch Times.

Lee views the tariffs as a strategic tool in boosting domestic income and securing supply chains.

He said the efficacy of Trump’s tariff policies, especially the reciprocal tariffs, relies on Trump’s other initiatives. The economist said that the new trade framework is attracting manufacturing back to the United States, along with innovation. Fewer regulations and lower tax rates will be the primary pull factors, and together with the push from tariffs, they will make Trump’s vision for a strong American economy within reach, Lee said.

Xie said that the additional investments, tax reductions, and tax rebates that Trump has announced are designed to result in income growth and reduced tax burden for American consumers.

Lee offers a different perspective, saying that the recent stock market decline and wider economic challenges are being “unfairly attributed” by the media and some economists to Trump’s tariff policies.

He said Trump’s tariffs have introduced uncertainty into the market but the impact has been overstated.

Economist Ian Fletcher thinks a recession is a real risk, not because of the size of U.S. exports or imports but because of the shock these significant reciprocal tariffs bring to the market.

“Trump has probably gotten very confident from what he did the first time,” Fletcher told The Epoch Times, referring to the limited economic impact of the tariffs he imposed during his first term. “But he is going way beyond what he did the first time.”

Fletcher thinks a five-year phase-in tariff regime would allow the market time to react rationally. There is a chance that Trump scales back the announced tariffs just like he did earlier in the year, he added. However, Trump has created uncertainty, adding on another dimension for businesses to consider as they make their investment plans, he said.

While differences in reasoning is driving differences in economist forecasts, economic indicators will start to reveal the real-world impacts as these tariffs become effective.

Xie said he will be looking to employment data and real income growth as meaningful early signs of the actual impact of Trump’s tariffs.

Lee, meanwhile, said he will be focusing on domestic versus foreign shares in consumption and investments in the United States. “Those are the leading indicators that people are talking with their wallets,” he said.

He added that if after the initial period of the tariffs, higher prices stick, then the risk of inflation will be real.