The EU Removes Bourbon from Initial Round of Tariffs on the US

The European Commission has ultimately removed bourbon and wine, as requested by France, from the list of tariffs of up to 25% that will be activated from April 15 on a series of imports from the United States. This will be the first retaliation to the tariff war launched by the Trump Administration last week, which the EU will begin to collect in three phases: April, May, and December.

This is stated in the proposal accessed by Europa Press, which EU Trade Commissioner Maros Sefcovic circulated among capitals on Monday afternoon, following an extraordinary meeting with EU trade ministers in Luxembourg. In that meeting, he received widespread support from member states for his strategy of combining initial countermeasures with pressure on Washington to seek a negotiated solution to the crisis.

The document will be put to a vote this Wednesday in a meeting of the Twenty-Seven's technical staff, with the aim of it coming into force by April 14. This will allow the first phase, based on the initial catalog of taxed products from the previous 2018 crisis, excluding bourbon, to be applied from April 15.

Thus, Brussels revises its initial proposal after "listening" to the capitals, as Sefcovic stated at the end of the meeting in Luxembourg, hinting at some adjustments without revealing specifics. This is also a gesture towards Trump, who, upon learning that bourbon was part of the European tariffs' first round, warned of retaliatory tariffs of "up to 200%" on European wines, champagne, and other spirits.

The rest of the list, to which Brussels has added new products to match the impact level that the United States will generate with its tariffs on European steel and aluminum, can start being collected from May 16, according to the document. The exception would be the soy and almond quotas, which will be postponed to December 1, due to the harvest calendar.

The commissioner, speaking on behalf of the Twenty-Seven in trade matters and acting as the EU's interlocutor with Washington in this crisis, also warned from Luxembourg that the retaliation to the 25% tariffs on European steel and aluminum would not reach the maximum impact level of 26 billion euros initially estimated by Brussels.

Specifically, the EU proposal foresees surcharges of between 10% and 25% on a wide range of products, some of which, to be applied from April, are based on the catalog used in 2018 and 2020, with an estimated value of up to 8 billion euros. The rest are additional products, and EU services estimated they could have an impact of up to 18 billion euros, although Brussels has ultimately decided not to reach the maximum level.

These countermeasures respond solely to Trump's initial tariffs on steel and aluminum, as the EU executive continues to "calibrate" a "firm and proportionate" response to the remaining 25% tariffs Trump decreed on car imports and components and the 20% on all European imports.