President Trump signed an executive order on Tuesday overseeing his Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick and directing him to begin an investigation into whether foreign copper production and importing materials into the US would possibly pose. Risks to America’s economic and national security.
White House officials said, according to the findings of the survey that new tariffs are widely used in manufacturing and construction, but are applicable to foreign copper, a material that is key to emerging technologies such as the US military and artificial intelligence. He said he could.
White House officials were scarce in details during a call Tuesday afternoon. If the investigation is likely to end, which rate of customs will be set and when will it take effect? This will all be understood in “Trump Time,” one official said repeatedly.
Potential tariffs have helped protect the domestic copper industry, which the White House says is undermined by unfair trade practices by other countries, and they struggle to compete. Copper is an essential component of ships, aircraft and tank buildings, among other things. The Trump administration on Tuesday said that electric vehicles and AI need metals, framed it as a national defense issue as economic, and geopolitical disruption cuts the US from necessary supplies He said he could.
“Taxes can help build the American copper industry and strengthen national defense if necessary,” Rutnick said. “American industry relies on copper and should be made in the US, with no exemptions or exceptions.”
“It’s time for the copper to go home,” he added.
But like the steel and aluminum tariffs that President Trump has promised to recover next month, copper tariffs will depend on metals and raise the costs of various other industries that could generate rebound from them. Masu. This includes manufacturers of automobiles, electronics and communications equipment, as well as construction companies that use copper for plumbing, roof construction and other uses.
Tariffs could also trigger a new battle with foreign countries that ship metals to the United States. The largest foreign copper source in the United States is Chile, sending $4.63 billion in metal to the United States each year, further distant by Canada, Peru, Mexico and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. China is also a major global producer of copper, but due to the previously imposed tariffs, it has hardly been sent to the relatively few US.
White House officials say China’s copper production is still lowering global prices, and China was stealing copper resources around the world.
In a call with a reporter on Tuesday, China said that China “long-term overcapacity and dumping of industry as an economic weapon to control global markets,” Peter Navarro, a senior trade and manufacturing counselor, said in a call from other countries. He said he systematically weakened his competitors. “We can now use the same model to control the global copper market,” he said.
Asked how the president touched on copper issues, one of the magistrates in Tuesday’s callers said, “My boss is playing three-dimensional chess in this world, and he is the rest of us. The part is looking far ahead. “Officers referenced an interview in the 1980s. Trump spoke about his trade with Oprah Winfrey. It “predicted a lot of the ways he thought about how foreign governments were cheating on us and how we had to respond, like tariffs and mutual trade.”
Trump has threatened to impose tariffs on various imports, including steel, aluminum, copper, automobiles and medicines. He also came within hours of imposing tariffs on Canada and Mexico earlier this month, saying that countries have not done enough to stop the flow of drugs and immigration into the United States. He suspended those duties for a month, but this week they said it would come into effect on March 4th, as planned.
Trump also imposed an additional 10% tariff on all products from China, causing retaliatory tariffs from China. He then introduced plans to dramatically reform US tariff rates in other countries by changing the tariff levels that other countries charge to the US.
The copper investigation is conducted under section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act, which allows the president to impose tariffs on foreign products for national security. By law, the Secretary of Commerce has 270 days to present the findings from the investigation into the president.
Copper prices rose this year ahead of the expected tariffs and continued resilience of manufacturing activities, according to a memo from CITI analysts earlier this month. The US consumed about $17 billion in copper in 2024, importing about 45% of that amount, analysts said.
Rebecca F. Elliott Reports of contributions.
