Just as his administration is getting ready with nations falling into the “reciprocal tariffs” list on April 2, President Donald Trump came up with another curve ball: a country importing oil from Venezuela will face a 25 per cent tariff on any product exported to the US, friend or foe.
Technically that would include America as it imported some $6 billions worth of petroleum from Venezuela, but a two month exemption has been given to Chevron that pumps that oil and gas out of that Latin American country.
Venezuela has long been on the radar of President Trump as it has consistently been on the list of those nations deliberately and deceitfully sending violent gang members, thugs and lunatics across the southern borders.
At first Caracas refused to accept deportee flights but subsequently relented.
In the last two years Venezuela has been on and off the target of punitive measures: in 2023 the Biden administration briefly lifted sanctions only to be reimposed in April 2024 accusing President Nicolas Maduro of not having free and fair elections.
The joint venture licence that Chevron had to pump oil was to have been revoked on April 3 but was extended to May 27 following talks between the President and that company’s top executives.
Still there is little to indicate Washington is going to extend the deadline or walk back on the tariff threat.
According to media reports, China took in nearly 70 per cent of Venezuela’s oil exports in 2023 with others like Russia, Spain, Vietnam, Singapore and India also being in the list of recipients.
It is said that India imported some 22 million barrels in 2024, less than two per cent of its total purchases.
But the tariff math vis-à-vis Beijing is troublesome indeed: given the already 20 per cent across the board on all goods plus the additional 25 per cent on steel and aluminium, the Venezuela oil tariff add-on would mean 45 per cent on all that America imports from China with steel and aluminium staring at 70 per cent tax. All this has some wondering if the Venezuelan oil slap was actually intended for China primarily.
In all this if the markets have not reacted negatively there is a faint hope that there will be some re-thinking in Washington.
‘Liberation Day’
In the midst of the Venezuela sideshow, the ‘Liberation Day’ is very much on where the focus is on the so-called reciprocal tariffs that is to be announced on April 2. The Trump administration is not willing to see this as an imposition, rather as a retribution and reciprocity for taxes and barriers of others, the list including friends and allies. “April 2nd is going to be liberation day for America. We’ve been ripped off by every country in the world, friend and foe”, Trump said at the White House stressing flexibility “but basically it’s reciprocal”.
It may be difficult to read what is on the President’s mind insofar as the reciprocal list is concerned, but few doubt of Trump’s determination to seek an even playing field that in his view has been denied all along. According to one version, the prime focus is on the “Dirty 15”, or the top 15 per cent of the perceived worst offenders. It remains to be seen if India, consistently seen as one of the “worst”, will get on the list even as officials of the two countries are busily working on a bilateral trade deal.
Or as the Treasury Secretary, Scott Bessent, put it, “It’s 15 per cent of the countries, but it’s a huge amount of our trading volume”. Whether all of this puts tens of billions of dollars or trillions into the pockets of Americans is the question.
The writer is a senior journalist who has reported from Washington DC on North America and United Nations