US to tariff Japanese autos ‘to be fair’

Japan’s hopes for an exemption from US tariffs on imported autos have been dashed.

On Friday, US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick told Fox Business that, “If you’re going to tariff cars from anywhere, it’s got to be tariffing cars from everywhere. That would be fair, right? Don’t make it so that Japan has an unfair advantage over Korea or Germany or anywhere.”

After Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba’s apparently successful meeting with President Donald Trump at the White House in early February, the Japanese had been reminding themselves of the “promise” that Trump made to former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe that he would not put additional tariffs on Japanese autos and auto parts.