One day after the Trump administration imposed 25% tariffs on imports from Canada and Mexico, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said President Donald Trump is granting Detroit's big three automakers a one-month exemption.

She said Ford, General Motors and Stellantis requested the exemption in a phone call with Trump but will still be subject to reciprocal tariffs expected to take effect April 2.

What You Need To Know

  • One day after the Trump administration imposed 25% tariffs on imports from Canada and Mexico, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said President Donald Trump is granting Detroit's big three automakers a one-month exemption

  • She said Ford, General Motors and Stellantis requested the exemption in a phone call with Trump but will still be subject to reciprocal tariffs expected to take effect April 2

  • On Wednesday morning, U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick suggested in an interview with Bloomberg TV that the companies may be exempted from the recent tariffs on Canada and Mexico

  • He said the tariffs will remain at 25%, but “there will be some categories left out"

"At the request of the companies associated with the USMCA (United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement), the president is giving them an exemption for one month so they are not at an economic disadvantage," Leavitt said. 

On Wednesday morning, U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick suggested in an interview with Bloomberg TV that the companies may be exempted from the recent tariffs on Canada and Mexico.

“The United States, Mexico and Canada agreement set up some policies that said you’ve got to have a certain amount of U.S. content in your products to be USMCA compliant, so I think he’s thinking about those categories,” Lutnick said.

“Doesn’t that make sense to you? if you complied with the agreement that maybe you avoid tariffs and if you didn’t comply with the agreement, well, you did so at your own risk,” he said.

He said the tariffs will remain at 25%, but “there will be some categories left out.”

The Detroit automakers all say they are compliant with the United States–Mexico–Canada Agreement that Trump signed in 2018.

The auto industry represents 3% of U.S gross domestic product and supports 4.5% of all private-sector U.S. jobs, employing about 9.7 million workers, according to the Alliance for Automotive Innovation.

Lutnick insisted the tariffs the Trump administration imposed Tuesday were not intended to set off a trade war. He said the U.S. is engaged in a drug war with the two countries.

“We’ve got fentanyl still pouring into the country, and it’s got to stop,” he said. “What’s happened is they’re showing us even more ways to try to stop the flow of fentanyl. If they can stop the flow of fentanyl, the president is open-minded.”