The European Union’s largest economies have rejected a US attempt to resolve a long-running dispute over metals tariffs, injecting fresh uncertainty into the ratification of a transatlantic trade deal that has already faced repeated delays since it was first agreed last July.
Germany and France voiced frustration in a closed meeting of EU envoys after the US recently changed how it calculates tariffs on hundreds of products containing steel and aluminium — a modification Washington presented as an olive branch to address European concerns. But after EU officials and industry groups crunched the numbers, the adjustment proved to fall well short of expectations. France and Germany noted that the tweak actually worsens the tariff situation for roughly half of the affected products, while VDMA, a major German industrial association, calculated that the average tariff rate for affected companies had risen from 21% to 26%.
The European Commission said it is considering possible responses, though it has not yet specified what form these might take. EU Trade Commissioner Maroš Šefčovič raised the metals tariff issue during a visit to Washington last week but failed to achieve a breakthrough. Both sides have agreed to continue technical discussions, and the Commission told EU envoys that more fully implementing some of the bloc’s existing trade deal commitments could help unlock concessions from the US side.
The metals dispute traces back to August last year, when Washington widened a 50% tariff on steel and aluminium to cover hundreds of additional products containing these metals — a move that drew accusations from Brussels that the US was already violating the spirit of the July agreement. Under that initial deal, the EU agreed to eliminate tariffs on US industrial goods in exchange for a 15% ceiling on most EU exports, a lopsided arrangement the bloc accepted to keep President Donald Trump engaged on Ukraine and avoid a broader trade rupture.
The path to ratification has since been repeatedly disrupted. EU lawmakers paused the process twice — first after Trump threatened to take Greenland, and again after the US Supreme Court invalidated Washington’s global tariff regime. More recently both sides had expressed a renewed desire to conclude ratification, with EU member states and lawmakers simultaneously negotiating amendments including an expiration clause and stronger safeguards for European industries — provisions the Commission has warned could derail the accord entirely.
