Donald Trump and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen (Image: GETTY)
Britain is well placed to reap the benefits of Brexit in the wake of Donald Trump’s US Presidential election triumph - especially if the EU makes the mistake of picking a fight with the combative billionaire, a Brussels insider has predicted.
Pieter Cleppe, editor of BrusselsReport.eu, was speaking a week after Republican Mr Trump’s resounding victory over Democrat challenger Kamala Harris, with all eyes on Washington as he continues to unveil key appointments.
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Mr Trump has proposed tariffs that could range widely, with a standard 10–20% tariff on all imports to the US, designed as a “universal baseline” for goods across sectors.
For goods imported from China, he has suggested rates as high as 60%, and at times, possibly even up to 100% on specific items. Such high tariffs are part of his "America First" approach to encourage domestic manufacturing and reduce reliance on foreign goods.
Mr Cleppe told Express.co.uk: "According to reports, the UK government reportedly believes that Trump is likely to water down his blanket approach to tariffs because it would push up inflation in the US.
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Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer outside Number 10 (Image: Getty)
"UK Ministers think that Trump is instead likely to pursue a sector-by-sector approach, with a focus on tariffs on steel, aluminium, technology and cars.”
However, the insider think that the EU is going to "strike first" against Trump - a move he says would be "deeply misguided."
He said: "The EU on the other hand, is apparently considering to strike first against Trump. This would be deeply misguided, looking at Trump's charachter and how also during his first term he has acted in a very transactional manner.”
In all likelihood, Mr Trump’s plan was to threaten tariffs while presenting a list of demands to trading partners, together with an explanation of how they can avoid these being imposed, Mr Cleppe suggested.
He continued: "Apart from demanding to slash EU tariffs, Trump is likely also going to ask the EU to stop demanding its trading partners to respect EU regulations.
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"The most prominent example of this is the EU’s deforestation legislation, about to enter into force in 2026. This piece of EU regulation introduces a whole range of extra bureaucracy on imports into the EU that are deemed to worsen deforestation.”
Such an approach had already damaged trade relations between the EU - led by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen - and South East Asian palm oil exporters such as Malaysia and Indonesia, Mr Cleppe pointed out.
He explained: "They found it particularly unfair that despite NGOs like Global Forest Watch praising them in 2023 for achieving a sharp reduction in forest loss, the EU has, unlike the UK, refused to declare their standards as equivalent.
"Afterwards, also Brazil and the United States have complained about it. Furthermore, Trump will certainly also ask the EU to stop going after US big tech with excessive, innovation-hostile regulation and monstrous fines.”
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Kamala Harris delivers her concession speech last week (Image: Getty)
The EU’s loss could end up being Britain’s gain however, Mr Cleppe argued.
He said: “For the UK, there is a chance it may escape tariffs altogether, according to some rumours. Even in case things turn out otherwise, the UK government will reportedly not resort to retaliatory tariffs against the US, as it considers that such a move would only provoke Donald Trump and have little benefit.
"If the EU takes a different view and decides to escalate any tariffs into a trade war with the US, this will turn out to be yet another benefit of Brexit."