Lawmakers in the US Congress are debating the impact of the Trump administration’s ever-fluctuating tariffs on the seafood sector, with a handful of Republicans crossing the aisle in favor of curtailing the president’s authority to implement tariffs without review.
U.S. President Donald Trump has moved swiftly in the first few months of his second administration to improve the nation’s trade deficit by implementing wide-ranging tariffs on foreign goods – though he’s walked many of the tariffs back just as quickly.
On 9 April, Trump announced a 90-day pause on tariffs for most countries, while simultaneously raising tariffs on Chinese goods to 125 percent.
Throughout the uncertainty over Trump’s escalating trade war, U.S. lawmakers have debated how the tariffs will impact the U.S. seafood industry. While some domestic fishers believe they stand to benefit from tariffs on their foreign competition, some lawmakers argue tariffs will harm domestic producers and processors.
“I share the President’s goal of getting more of that manufacturing done in the state of Maine, done in the United States, but the fact is that if we impose these tariffs on Canadian processing, it is going to be our Maine lobstermen who will bear the cost; it is going to be consumers who bear the cost,” Collins said on the Senate floor in support of a resolution opposing Trump’s tariffs on Canada.
According to Collins, the tariffs on Canada will actually hurt American lobstermen, who rely on Canadian processing capacity to get their products to market. There are currently only 15 lobster processing plants in the United States compared to 240 in Canada. Maine sends between USD 200 million and USD 400 million (EUR 179-358 million) worth of lobster to Canada for processing every year.
Collins also pointed to aquaculture as a sector that will likely be harmed by tariffs on Canada.
“In Washington County in far eastern Maine, Cooke Aquaculture is one of the largest employers, with more than 200 direct jobs throughout the State. While they have a processing plant in Machias, Maine, the first step of their salmon processing occurs in Canada before reentering the United States for finishing,” Collins said. “At a time when the Maine aquaculture industry is growing, these tariffs on Canada would jeopardize current jobs and also block future ones.”
Other lawmakers maintain that tariffs are necessary to protect domestic producers from seafood imports.
“President Trump’s views on tariffs – they aren’t complicated,” U.S. Senator Tommy Tuberville (R-Alabama) said on the Senate floor. “He believes, as I do, that America has been ripped off by unfair trade deals for decades and simply wants a level playing field. We have to change directions. What we are doing is not working.”
“U.S. catfish and shrimp producers have faced some of the worst blows, for example,” Tuberville added. “Vietnam is dumping billions – I repeat, billions – of pounds of catfish, and India is dumping billions of pounds of shrimp every year into U.S. markets, flooding the markets and reducing the price for our quality domestic products. It is devastating.”