Trump is destroying global trust in the US  

President Trump’s tariff policy is shredding global trust in the U.S. and risks driving friends and allies closer into China’s orbit.  

Many of the tariffs imposed by Trump breach U.S. treaty-based trade agreements. This has called into question the value of all U.S. treaty commitments, including those relating to national defense. As a result, U.S. friends from Australia to Japan to Canada are being forced to reassess the extent they can rely on America. For those countries that confront Chinese economic pressure and territorial claims, less trust in U.S. economic and defense commitments will constrain their willingness to work with the U.S. when it comes to competing with China.  

U.S. treaties are signed by the president; once ratified by the Senate, they are binding international law commitments. On Apr. 2, Trump imposed a 10 percent tariff on all imports. This tariff also applies to the U.K. and Australia, inconsistent with U.S. commitments under the World Trade Organization as well as the free trade agreement that the U.S. has with Australia.  

The U.K. and Australia are also our closest defense partners, and the U.S. has a collective defense treaty with each country. According to the State Department, “Australians and Americans have fought side by side in every major U.S. military conflict of the past century, including World Wars I and II, Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq.”

When it comes to the U.K., the State Department claims that “The United States has no closer Ally than the United Kingdom.” And in 2021, Australia, the U.K. and the U.S. launched AUKUS, a trilateral security partnership that includes jointly developing nuclear-powered submarines for Australia, in large part to counter growing security threats from China.   

Trump has also proposed additional tariffs against Japan of 24 percent and South Korea of 25 percent. The U.S. has a trade agreement with South Korea that Trump updated during his first term in office, and the U.S. also has defense treaties with both countries. 

Trump has imposed tariffs on non-U.S. content of auto imports from Canada and Mexico, the U.S.’s closest neighbors and largest trading partners. These tariffs are inconsistent with the United-States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, which Trump negotiated and described as “the largest, fairest, most balanced, and modern trade agreement ever achieved.” 

And across the Atlantic, the European Union faces additional tariffs of 20 percent and uncertainty about the strength of the U.S. commitment under NATO to collective defense. 

The U.S. has traditionally sought to work with allies to strengthen their economies and self-defense capabilities. Economically strong allies expand markets for U.S. exports and creates capable partners when it comes to national defense. Working with allies is also critical when it comes to U.S. competition with China. 

For Trump, these tariffs seem aimed at getting all countries to negotiate better trade deals. The U.S. may have some success here, but from a broader geopolitical perspective, the costs to the U.S. will be high. By raising tariffs on friends and in breach of so many trade agreements, Trump has degraded a critical commodity that has made the U.S. central to so many countries’ economic and defense planning — that is, trust.  

The result is that the value of existing and new trade commitments with the U.S. have been devalued, such that governments and business can no longer rely on these agreements to provide a stable basis for investing in the United States. For example, despite the May 8 U.S.-U.K. trade deal, the 10 percent tariff on imports from the U.K. remains in place. Since then, Trump has threatened 100 percent tariffs on imports of film, with no indication that film imports from the U.K. would not also be targeted. 

This decline in trust will also have implications for U.S. treaty-based defense commitments. When it comes to issues of national security the stakes are even higher, which means that small changes in assessments of trust in the U.S. have large ramifications for defense planning and geopolitical posture.  

And in only a few short months there are already visible results. On Mar. 30, China, Japan and Korea held their first trilateral economic dialogue in five years and announced they would jointly respond to U.S. tariffs. On the other side of the world, European President Ursula von der Leyen — a pro-American European if there ever was one — claimed that “The West as we know it no longer exists.” Following a call with Chinese Premier Li Qiang on Apr. 7, she released a statement underscoring the responsibility of Europe and China in supporting a reformed trading system.  

In short order, the cooperation and support that the U.S. had been building with its partners in Europe and Asia in developing a united response to China has begun to unravel, undermining the U.S. position when it comes to long-term competition with China. 

Rebuilding trust in the U.S. will not be easy but must start now. Standing down tariffs that breach trade commitments would be an important first step. Failure to rebuild trust risks further unravelling the economic and security structures that the U.S. has built over the last 80 years, leading to a geopolitical realignment that will only benefit China.   

Joshua P. Meltzer is a senior fellow in the Global Economy and Development Program at the Brookings Institution.