Grassley Continues To Lay Out Trade, Tax Agenda

More thoughts on upcoming trade talks, the partial government shutdown and tax policy are being offered by new Senate Finance Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa. After claiming the gavel at Senate Finance, Grassley has not shied away from discussing topics slated to hit the panel's agenda. He recently commented on the Trump administration's effort to secure approval of the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA). Now, Grassley is once again weighing in on upcoming U.S.-European Union (EU) free trade agreement talks and issuing a fresh warning about how the ongoing shutdown might impact them. New tariffs on imports of EU automobiles into the U.S. could be deployed by President Donald Trump as leverage in negotiations with the EU, according to Grassley. "I am not in favor of tariffs, but they are a fact of life when Trump's in the White House," Grassley told reporters. "They may be an effective tool. I know Europe is afraid of it." And, using those tariffs, he noted, is "probably the only thing that will bring Europe to the table in a reasonable way." Grassley's remarks are a shift from the stance he took initially that the U.S. should not "alienate our allies" with tariffs. As for coming trade talks with Europe, he said he warned EU Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom any U.S.-EU trade pact has to have agriculture in it. "My inference to Malmstrom was, 'what is the sense of negotiating if you don't include agriculture?'" he said. "Obviously, she took the opposite point of view."