Trump admin has begun trade investigations as a way to impose tariffs

The Trump administration announced it is investigating unfair trade practices in China, Mexico and Europe, as a step toward imposing new tariffs.

WASHINGTON – The Trump administration has begun investigating alleged unfair trade practices among trading partners around the world, to potentially impose tariffs that would replace the emergency tariffs that the Supreme Court struck down.

"The United States will no longer sacrifice its industrial base to other countries that may be exporting their problems with excess capacity and production to us," U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said in announcing the investigations of alleged overproduction of goods in China, Mexico and Europe.

The investigations are one way for President Donald Trump to continue collecting tariffs. Trump has argued tariffs are crucial to the country for government funding and threatening to impose them as a way to pressure countries to reach trade deals and companies to manufacture their products in the United States.

The economies subject to these investigations are: China, Mexico, the European Union, Singapore, Switzerland, Norway, Indonesia, Malaysia, Cambodia, Thailand, Korea, Vietnam, Taiwan, Bangladesh, Japan and India.

Greer said U.S. manufacturing faces challenges because trading partners are producing more than they can consume domestically.