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East County business leaders speak out on impacts of tariffs
By G. A. McNeeley
April 14, 2025 (San Diego) – On Wednesday, April 9, President Donald Trump temporarily dropped tariff rates on imports from most of the United States’ trade partners to 10% (for 90 days), to allow trade negotiations with those countries.
Trump announced the pause hours after goods from nearly 90 nations became subject to tariffs imposed by the United States, according to CNBC.
On Thursday, April 3, a libertarian group (that’s been funded by Leonard Leo and Charles Koch) mounted a lawsuit against Trump's tariffs (which sent international markets plummeting), according to The Guardian.
Why the 90-Day Pause?
Trump said on Truth Social that "more than 75 countries" contacted U.S. officials to negotiate after he unveiled his new tariffs on Wednesday, April 2.
When asked about the reason for this sudden decision, Trump told reporters, "Well, I thought that people were jumping a little bit out of line. They were getting yippy, you know, they were getting a little bit yippy, a little bit afraid," Trump added.
Trump also said on Truth Social that he was raising the tariffs imposed on imports from China to 125% "effective immediately" due to the "lack of respect that China has shown to the World's Markets."
China, which is the United States’ third-largest trading partner, said it would increase its tariff rate for imports from the U.S. to 84% in retaliation, according to CNBC.
Trump raised the tariffs on China even higher, to 145%, later in the week, according to BBC.
Trump said his import taxes will address unfairness in the global trading system, as well as bring jobs and factories back to the US, according to BBC.
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said on X that he and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent sat with Trump, while he wrote the Truth Social post. "The world is ready to work with President Trump to fix global trade, and China has chosen the opposite direction," Lutnick added.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, at a press conference, said that Trump "is feeling the heat from Democrats, and across America, about how bad these tariffs are.
"He keeps changing things from day to day. His advisers are fighting among themselves, calling each other names, and you cannot run a country with such chaos, with such unpredictability, with such lack of understanding of what's going on in the world and the facts,” Schumer added.
Exemption Of Some Electronic Devices
Trump's Administration has exempted smartphones, computers and other electronic devices from his tariffs, including the hefty rate imposed on Chinese imports. The exemption also includes semiconductors, solar cells and memory cards, according to BBC.
The move comes after concerns from US tech companies that the price of gadgets could skyrocket, as many of them are made in China.
This is the first significant reprieve of any kind in Trump's tariffs on China, with Dan Ives (global head of technology research at Wedbush Securities) describing it as a "game-changer scenario" on X.
The White House indicated the exemptions were made to ensure companies had more time to move production to the United States, according to BBC.
"President Trump has made it clear America cannot rely on China to manufacture critical technologies such as semiconductors, chips, smartphones, and laptops," White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement. "At the direction of the president, these companies are hustling to onshore their manufacturing in the United States as soon as possible."
Legal Challenge and Legislation to Block Trump’s Initial Import Tariffs
The New Civil Liberties Alliance filed a suit against Trump’s initial tariffs on exports from China, arguing that doing so under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) is unlawful, according to The Guardian.
The action from the alliance has the potential to be symbolic, given its backing from billionaire industrialist Koch and Leo, a wealthy legal activist who advised Trump on the nomination of three conservative supreme court justices during his first presidency.
The alliance filed its action on behalf of Simplified, a Florida-based home goods company whose business is reliant on imports from China. They argued that the president exceeded his powers in invoking the IEEPA to justify his previous tariffs.
“This statute authorizes specific emergency actions like imposing sanctions or freezing assets to protect the United States from foreign threats,” the alliance said in a statement. “It does not authorize the president to impose tariffs. In its nearly 50-year history, no other president – including President Trump in his first term – has ever tried to use the IEEPA to impose tariffs.”
Their lawsuit argues that there is no connection between the fentanyl epidemic (which Trump has previously cited as a reason for invoking the IEEPA) and the tariffs, according to The Guardian.
Republican Senator Rand Paul told the Washington Post, “I don’t want to live under emergency rule. I don’t want to live where my representatives cannot speak for me and have a check and balance on power.”
Republican Senator Chuck Grassley (along with Democrat Senator Maria Cantwell) introduced a bill that would limit Trump’s ability to impose or increase tariffs, by requiring Congress to approve them within 60 days. The White House budget office said that Trump would veto the bill, according to The Guardian.
It’s hard to say for certain if the backlash from Leo, Koch, Schumer, Paul, or other notable public figures led to Trump’s decision to pause his previously imposed import tariffs, but it’s something to consider.
East County Chamber of Commerce Leader Warns Consumers Would Face HIgher Prices from Tariffs
East County Magazine spoke with Rick Wilson, President & CEO of the San Diego East County Chamber of Commerce.
When asked how the tariffs could impact our local economy, Wilson said he doesn’t “see the new tariffs as being beneficial to the business community.”
Wilson went on to describe tariffs as a tax “that’s gonna be transferred over to the actual consumer here in America.” Wilson added “that there will be a negative impact on our local economy immediately.”
However, when referring to Trump’s temporary pause on the tariffs, Wilson said that he does “look at that right now as being positive” and that he also “watched the market rebound.”
When asked about what concerns he’s hearing from Chamber Members, Wilson said they’re concerned about the supply chain, rising costs being passed onto consumers, and losing potential clients.
Wilson said he’s “continuing to look for opportunities to help businesses in the community.”
Wilson added that Chamber Members are “very nervous about the tariffs” and that he doesn’t “know for sure yet if people have raised prices.”
When asked if certain industries that are being hit the hard by tariffs, Wilson mentioned “the materials needed by manufacturing.”
Wilson explained that if resources are coming from other countries (especially in manufacturing), tariffs might have an effect on contracts that the U.S. has with other countries, because “the cost is higher.”
“We haven’t heard any certain industry that has been hit the hardest, but we definitely know that those industries, especially in manufacturing, are probably most concerned about what it looks like for materials that we’re getting from other countries,” Wilson said.
Asked if any local businesses are concerned about getting shut down, because of these tariffs, Wilson said that he didn’t “know exactly of individual businesses,” but that he wants to do everything he “can to help these businesses.”
When asked if any local businesses benefitting from tariffs, Wilson said that he’s “not aware of any business so far that’s benefiting from the tariffs.”
When asked what changes he'd like to see, Wilson said he hopes “that the changes that would maybe come out of all of this is actually seeing American companies with materials” and that he hopes to see “a drop in pricing in everything.”
When referring to potential negotiations between countries, Wilson added that he and his Chamber Members “like the pause that’s happening, and we certainly hope during that pause, everything can be resolved, and we can move forward.”
La Mesa Chamber’s President Says It’s Too Soon to Asseess Tariffs’ Impacts
East County Magazine sent questions via email to Mary England, President and CEO of the La Mesa Chamber of Commerce. England said that she has “not seen an indicator yet about the tariffs impacting our local merchants” and that she believes “it is still too early to tell.”
England noted that her members’ “restaurants have seen an increase in products” over the past year already due to post-COVID inflation. England added, “They have either raised their prices to combat this increase, shortened their menus, and/or took items off the menu that would be too costly for their customers.”
Local businesses and their customers will have to contend with even more price hikes from foreign suppliers, if Trump reimposes hefty tariffs on more nations and keeps the stiff tariffs on imports from China.
Sources:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/apr/07/trump-tariffs-lawsuit
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c20xn626y81o.amp
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