Irish Examiner view: Trump tariff threat is yet another bully tactic

US president Donald Trump at a ceremony last Friday in Palm Beach, Florida, to rename part of a road as the President Donald J Trump Boulevard. Picture: Julia Demaree Nikhinson/AP

Like a classic schoolyard bully, Donald Trump wants something that’s not his, is open to taking it by force if not handed it, and has stomped all over the rule book.

As European leaders grapple with his latest tariff threat, Trump yesterday declined to say whether he would use force to seize Greenland. Instead, he opted for a clearly inflammatory: “No comment.”

In an interview with NBC News, he again doubled down on his plans to hit European nations with tariffs if he doesn’t get his way.

Earlier, in a letter to the Norwegian prime minister, he stated he no longer feels “an obligation to peace” following the alleged snub of not being awarded a Nobel Peace Prize. In many ways, it was typical Trump, but with much more at stake.

Europe has been here before. This time last year, Trump unleashed a barrage of tariffs as he waged a global war in his first weeks in office. 

Once again, European leaders have to meet Trump head-on and face down his bully-boy tactics.

However, as one analyst put it, they have to get the balance right. Don’t go far enough, and they look weak — emboldening Trump to go ever further. Go too far, and they risk a trade war.

As has been repeated by many commentators, tariffs are bad for both sides, and Ireland is particularly exposed.

Speaking to RTÉ, Irish Exporters Association CEO Simon McKeever said Ireland risks being “collateral damage” as tensions mount.

Well aware of the potential consequences, Tánaiste Simon Harris called for cool heads. However, he also warned that Ireland and the EU must prepare for all eventualities.

“The destabilising effect could potentially be enormous. The cascading effect could be very, very significant. Now is a time for cool heads. We have worked in good faith with the US administration to put a trade agreement in place. We want to see that agreement implemented in full. We don’t wish to see any deviation from that agreement.”

Harris said there was a “brief window” between now and February 1 to find a way forward.

Clearly, there is no place in the world order for Trump’s behaviour. Europe needs to demonstrate clearly that the EU collective and its individual members will not tolerate it.

Even in the face of the clear threat to American support for Ukraine, Europe cannot afford to let this one slip.

What's your view on this issue?

You can tell us here

Chilling reaction to ICE protests 

Not alone is the US government presiding over a deadly spectacle of cruelty in Minneapolis, but it is now intent on taking to task those politicians who have railed against the seemingly unaccountable actions of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents.

For daring to speak out against the aggressive immigration crackdown in the city, a criminal investigation into Democrat governor Tim Walz and Minneapolis mayor Jacob Frey has been launched in what is a major escalation in the fight between federal government and local officials.

It has been alleged that Walz and Frey have conspired to impede thousands of federal officers who have been sent to the city in the past month. On January 7, one of those officers shot and killed 37-year-old Renee Nicole Good.

In trying to prosecute both the governor and the mayor, the administration is trying to strangle the life out of any opposition to its plans — effectively intimidating elected officials into silence. As Frey judiciously pointed out, the only person not being investigated for the shooting of Good “is the agent who shot her”.

Both in and out of office, Trump has consistently railed against claimed attempts to “weaponise” the judicial system against him. Now, he is using exactly the same tactics against opponents of his immigration clampdown.

His department of justice has vowed to arrest anyone impeding the work of federal agents, but it has now run into accusations of authoritarianism. To anyone looking on from the outside at the heavy-handed actions of ICE agents in Minnesota, it certainly smacks of dangerously dictatorial behaviour. 

Todd Blanche, America’s deputy attorney general, accused Frey and Walz of encouraging violence against law enforcement and of “terrorism”. There is no evidence whatsoever that either has encouraged violence, not to mind engaged in acts of terrorism.

This is yet another dark sign that America has become a despotic place, ruled by a tyrannical and undemocratic administration. It is not a picture of the country we thought we would ever see, and neither is it one we ever wanted to see.

What's your view on this issue?

You can tell us here

War on Gaza

To be in the glare of global headlines because of the mindless and devastating warfare waged against Palestine and its people was bad enough. To have its current plight almost completely ignored is nearly worse.

It is one thing for famine and pestilence to stalk your land, but to be forgotten about as your children starve or die from treatable illnesses is entirely another.

Since October 10 last, when those Palestinians living in the Gaza Strip were told that a ceasefire had been agreed and that Israel’s genocidal war on them had paused, they saw an end to endless and indiscriminate aerial bombing. However, they did not see an end to the daily fare of arbitrary killings and targeted assassinations that is life under occupation.

Empowered by the absence of media glare and the pressure that went with it, the Israeli government and its military muscle has once more severely interrupted necessary food and medical aid supplies.

Internationally renowned aid agencies have been banned from operating in Gaza. We have known for some time that the humanitarian situation in the territory is apocalyptic, but with the eyes of the world now focused on other international dramas, their plight is once more ignored.

With a lack of sufficient food, no access to clean drinking water, a near complete absence of medicines, as well as Israeli aggression, the appointment of a “peace board” to decide Palestinians’ future means little to those trying to eke out ways of survival.