Typical Donald J. Trump chaos…..
Except this is about countries and millions of people and billions….
“The entire process, the tone, time schedules — all these elements — are annoying people here and harming the image of the United States in an unnecessary fashion,” he said.
It isn’t winning fans at home, either. Late Sunday night, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross announced procedures on how U.S.-based importers or users of foreign steel and aluminum could apply for tariff waivers on specific products that may not be available domestically. In the past, companies have been able to get product waivers before such tariffs were implemented.
That’s impossible this time around. It was only on Monday that an online form was made available for companies to file for product exclusions, and the Commerce Department said it would take 90 days to review the detailed application — meaning that U.S.-based car producers, appliance makers and other firms will have to pay the hefty tariffs and hope that they will get reimbursed if they later receive exemptions.
“There’s just too many questions on retroactivity,” said Brett Guge, an executive vice president at California Steel Industries, which processes imported steel from Brazil, Mexico and Japan. Guge said his Fontana company will work on the product-exclusion application this week. “It is what it is, as far as the timeline,” he said. “Doesn’t matter what we think. We don’t have a lot of time.”
In issuing the tariffs, Trump moved to fulfill a campaign promise to aid domestic steelworkers and get tough on trade rivals, whom the president blames for America’s industrial and economic troubles. He surprised his own staff in previewing the tariffs March 1, saying they would apply to all countries, only later to temporarily exclude Canada and Mexico on the condition that they renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement to Trump’s satisfaction….