French President Emmanuel Macron has urged companies to halt investments in the US until US President Donald Trump clarifies his harsh and unjustified new tariffs on Europe and other countries. His remarks came after Trump imposed heavy tariffs, including a 20 per cent tax on imports from the European Union.
Macron also called on Europe to stand together in terms of their response, warning against any unilateral action. He described these tariffs as brutal and unfounded and said that they would have a massive impact on the European economy.
European leaders have condemned Donald Trump’s tariffs as “fundamentally wrong” and creating an “immense difficulty for Europe”, while appealing for last-ditch negotiations to avert an all-out trade war.
The French president, Emmanuel Macron, said Trump’s decision to impose tariffs was “brutal and unfounded” and appeared to call for a suspension of French investment in the US until the tariffs were clarified.
“Future investments, investments announced in the last weeks, should be suspended for a time for as long as the situation with the United States is not clarified,” Macron told a meeting of French companies.
Suggesting measures against the US tech sector “where the United States benefits enormously from Europe”, he added: “Nothing is excluded. All the elements are on the table.”
Spain’s prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, lambasted Donald Trump’s “protectionist” tariffs, saying they ran “contrary to the interests of millions of citizens on this side of the Atlantic and in the US, who will unfortunately see their businesses and their purchase power” affected by the measures.
In a strongly worded and defiant speech in Madrid on Thursday morning, Sánchez said the US administration did not distinguish between friends and enemies: “It goes against everyone and everything.”
Sánchez described the tariffs as an “unprecedented” and “unilateral” US attack on Europe, adding: “Returning to the protectionism of the 19th century isn’t a smart way of tackling the challenges of the 21st century.”