By David MacDonald I t was signed, sealed, and delivered on June 29. It was addressed to US Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross. And it was also posted online in an effort to demonstrate to tax payers on both sides of the border that it was a decla- ration to defend jobs and consumer prices. That’s accord- ing to Bloomberg’s David Welch, Christopher Condon, and Maciej Onoszko, who outlined in their pre-tariff date article how Magna International, one of the biggest of the big automotive giants in North America, views the Trump administration’s latest tryst with tariffs. James Tobin, Magna International’s CMO, penned the letter which emphasized that “tariffs or other trade barriers on imported automobiles and/or automotive parts would weaken the US economy and threaten to undermine the entire US automotive industry.” The plea from the Southern Ontario-based Magna is in chorus with appeals from Ger- man-based BMW, South Korean-based Hyundai, and American icon General Motors, not to mention the EU. The European Union warned the Trump administration of “severe disruption” just days after the President signed sweeping measures in early May designed to reformNAFTA and “enhance US national security,” a claim Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, among other world leaders, has questioned and even repudiated.
ident’s mid-July tour of Europe during which he labelled the EU “a foe” as well as the now historically-infamous Trump-Putin summit in Helsinki, Finland which left Angela Merkel’s top diplomat Heiko Maas in a position not familiar to Germans since 1945. “If the American president identifies the European Union as a ‘foe,’ this unfortunately shows once more how wide the Atlantic has become in political terms.” Now, if legitimate historical precedent and concerns from the automotive industry aren’t enough for the President to change his mind maybe this will be: according to CBC News, US beer drinkers are now paying more as aluminum tariffs aimed at Canadian steel manufacturers hit cans of every size and description. The CBC’s Duncan McCue spoke with Isaac Showaski, the CEO of Octopi Brewing out of Waukanee, Wisconsin who said that “It’s terrible. It’s hitting our bottom line… we probably could have hired almost two people full-time. We have all these big plans to invest and hire more people. But when we get these extra costs, we just can’t do it.” For now, at least, it seems like Tobin’s sentiment is a univer- sal one whether it be big business or a family-owned and operated dream come true.
Each of these aforementioned newsbytes predate the Pres-
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SPOTLIGHT ON BUSINESS MAGAZINE • JULY 2018
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