Howard Lutnick, U.S. Secretary of Commerce speaks throughout the Pennsylvania Power And Innovation Summit 2025 at Carnegie Mellon College in Pittsburgh on July 15, 2025.
David A. Grogan | CNBC
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick mentioned Sunday that Aug. 1 is the deadline for nations to start paying tariffs to the USA, however mentioned that “nothing stops nations from speaking to us after August 1.”
“That is a tough deadline, so on August 1, the brand new tariff charges will are available,” Lutnick mentioned on CBS Information, when requested concerning the deadline for his tariffs on the European Union.
President Donald Trump’s tariff deadline has shifted since he introduced his steep levies on buying and selling companions on April 2, however White Home officers now keep that Aug. 1 is a agency deadline.
“Nothing stops nations from speaking to us after August 1, however they’ll begin paying the tariffs on August 1,” Lutnick mentioned.
Lutnick mentioned that some small nations, “the Latin American nations, the Caribbean nations, many nations in Africa,” would have a baseline tariff of 10%.
Lutnick’s feedback may convey aid for nations anxiously awaiting a definitive determination on tariff charges from Trump, who lately urged that baseline tariff charges for these nations may very well be over 10%.
The president introduced final week that letters to smaller nations can be despatched out quickly. “We’ll most likely set one tariff for all of them … most likely a little bit over 10%,” Trump mentioned.
Lutnick added that “the larger economies will both open themselves up or they will pay a good tariff to America.”
Lutnick’s feedback come after Trump earlier this month despatched letters to buying and selling companions notifying them of the brand new tariff charges, which reached as excessive as 40% for some nations.
The letters, posted on Trump’s Reality Social, mentioned that tariffs would take impact Aug. 1, prompting last-minute negotiations from buying and selling companions in search of a decrease fee.