Vice President Kamala Harris, slated to give her acceptance speech tonight as the Democratic Party’s nominee for the presidency, would likely infuse U.S. trade policy with more environmental stipulations and might be a little less indiscriminate with tariffs than her two predecessors, according to several trade experts I consulted.
First, of course, she would have to defeat her Republican challenger, former President Donald Trump, with whom she is in a close race.
I went searching for expert opinions because her voting record is relatively scant, given her short tenure in the U.S. Senate, and she has made no pronouncements in the few weeks since she replaced President Biden atop the ticket.
That contrasts sharply with Trump, who unraveled decades of general trade policy consensus, most noticeably with wide-ranging tariffs imposed against allies and adversaries, and is proposing even stiffer tariffs on friends and foe alike, should he be re-elected. Interestingly, Harris did call this a “Trump tax.”
There are at least three important issues:
- Sweeping and unprecedented tariffs on $350 billion in Chinese imports, instituted by Trump and largely kept by President Biden.
- The mandatory six-year review of the USMCA, the hemispheric trade agreement which passed in 2020, with environmental and labor issues likely to be important to a Harris Administration.
- The lack of sufficient appellate judges at the World Trade Organization since the end of 2019, rendering it incapable of enforcing or resolving international trade disputes. Would Harris, a former prosecutor, want to release the U.S. block on the appointments?
But tonight, Harris gets to talk about what she wants. Said one of the experts, don’t expect much on international trade.
Trade might be mentioned “in passing, or only about bringing jobs back to America and the need for a strong industrial policy — policies for the middle class — the usual stuff,” said Jerry Haar, Ph.D., professor of international business and director for the Americas at Florida International University.
I also reached out to Jeffrey Schott, a senior fellow working on international trade policy and economic sanctions at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington; and Allen Morrison, Ph.D., professor in the Thunderbird School of Global Management at Arizona State University, where he was previously CEO and director-general, senior advisor for global management education and executive education initiatives.
Morrison suggested you will likely hear from her on international trade on the relatively short campaign trail. The election is Nov. 5, less than 11 weeks away. The two debate on Sept. 10.
“During the campaign, we can expect a great deal of political rhetoric with Harris taking tough stances vis-à-vis the Chinese and on global trade more generally,” he said.
One vote she cast while in the Senate was against the USMCA in 2020, President Trump’s successor to NAFTA. It passed 89-10 in the Senate, where she was one of nine Democrats to vote no, with her decision based on environmental concerns.
That vote stands as a precursor to how a Harris Administration might handle the USCMA review with Canada and Mexico, slated for 2026.
“Harris voted against USMCA because of its substandard provisions on trade and climate,” said Schott, from the Peterson Institute. “I assume a Harris Administration would put more focus on the nexus of trade and climate issues in talks with our USMCA partners.”
That could affect not only Mexico, which has replaced China as the nation’s No. 1 trade partner and is close to replacing it as the No. 1 importer into the United States, but it could also affect Canada, from which the United States has long imported the majority of its oil.
Morrison concurs, suggesting a Harris Administration would “emphasize trade deals that promote greener and cleaner products while at the same time introducing additional barriers on polluting industries including fossil fuels.”
While the USMCA review is etched in stone, most of the other trade issues would be at the discretion of a President Harris.
What would a President Harris do about China? Trump, while president, slapped China with more than $350 billion in import tariffs, tariffs Biden has largely left in place while adding tariffs in a few other areas.
Here’s where Schott sees a slightly different tack, at least from Trump.
“Biden has maintained many of Trump’s trade policies but has at least worked to reduce the damage to trade with our friends and allies,” he said, mentioning the changes to Trump’s steel and aluminum restrictions, the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework and consultations on export controls.
“Simply put, Harris would treat friends and allies like friends and allies, unlike Trump who penalized more steel trade from Europe, Canada, Mexico, Japan, and South Korea than he did from China,” Schott said.
Said Morrison, from Thunderbird, “Harris is not well known to the Chinese and up until now has refused to be interviewed by the U.S. press on trade-related issues. Her approach to Chinese tariffs is an open question.
“Notwithstanding this caveat, it is expected that Harris will be more strategic and targeted in her approach to tariffs on Chinese goods,” he said. “Harris will likely increase tariffs on a select number of strategic sectors – solar cells, electric vehicles, semiconductors, and steel are prime examples— while cutting back on Trump’s use of indiscriminate tariffs.”
What about the World Trade Organization? It has been without a sufficient number of appellate judges to rule since the end of 2019, blocked by both Trump and Biden. Would Harris risk allowing the WTO to once again settle international disputes, knowing that they could, as has been in the case, go against the United States? Could she keep her prosecutor hat off?
“Harris’s future policy on WTO enforcement is completely opaque and would be shaped almost entirely by her advisors,” said Morrison.
Said Schott, sounding a slightly more optimistic note, “Harris would have the U.S. play a more constructive role than Trump in updating world trading rules in the WTO, but that is a very low bar to clear.”
While Trump’s trade policies were constantly in the news, given their departure from post-World War II norms, interest waned during the Biden Administration, despite Biden largely keeping those tariffs and choosing not to pursue or pass a foreign trade agreement, a first for the United States in decades.
“Trade will not be a priority” in a Harris Administration said Haar, from Florida International University. “It earns her nothing, is too contentious, and both parties have soured on trade in general. The only thing that will change is style, not substance. I suspect her team will be ‘nicer’ than (Trump USTR Robert) Lighthizer and (Trump’s Director of Trade and Manufacturing Policy) Peter Navarro.”