Donald Trump announces Vietnam trade deal with terrible terms for Asian nation
Donald Trump
took to
Truth Social to announce
a trade deal with the 'Socialist Republic of Vietnam.'
"It is my Great Honor to announce that I have just made a Trade Deal with the
Socialist Republic of Vietnam
after speaking with To Lam, the Highly Respected General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam,"
Trump wrote
.
Vietnam already has a 46 percent tariff rate with the U.S., prior to the deal. According to Trump's announcement, "Vietnam will pay the United States a 20% Tariff on any and all goods sent into our Territory, and a 40% Tariff on any Transshipping."
Read More
Related Articles
Ivanka Trump flaunts figure in form-fitting pink gown at Jeff Bezos' wedding
Read More
Related Articles
Iran unleashes cyber attack on Trump's Truth Social as expert warns of chilling escalation
Transshipping usually means exports that come from China but pass through Vietnam to dodge tariffs on Chinese goods.
"In return, Vietnam will do something that they have never done before, give the United States of America TOTAL ACCESS to their Markets for Trade," Trump continued. "In other words, they will 'OPEN THEIR MARKET TO THE UNITED STATES,' meaning that, we will be able to sell our product into Vietnam at ZERO Tariff."
He added that he thinks SUVs 'will be a wonderful addition to the various product lines within Vietnam.'
Vietnam is an important manufacturing hub for America.
According to the
U.S. Trade Representative
, the total value of U.S. goods imports from Vietnam was over $136 billion in 2024, while the U.S. goods exports to Vietnam were just over $13 billion.
The U.S. goods trade deficit, or the difference between the value of goods imported into the United States and the value of goods exported from the United States, with Vietnam was over $123 billion, reports The Hill.
Negotiations with Vietnam's General Secretary Tô Lâm took place last week with the goal of avoiding the reimposition of a 46 percent tariff on Vietnam.
The original tariff was originally levied due to Vietnam's large trade surplus with America.
According to Reuters, during those negotiations last week the U.S. presented a list of tough trade demands, including urging Vietnam to reduce the use of Chinese technology in products exported to the U.S.
Vietnam's exports have hit a post-pandemic high in recent years.
In response to U.S. pressure, Vietnam is cracking down on illegal trans-shipment of Chinese goods and has signaled its willingness to lower non-tariff barriers and increase imports of U.S. products such as planes, agricultural goods, and energy - though it remains unclear if any of these will be a part of the final deal that Trump just announced.
Trump said he reached the agreement after speaking with Vietnamese General Secretary To Lam, which he said was an 'absolute pleasure.'
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Irish Post
an hour ago
- Irish Post
The Ireland that still works
THIS Ireland might be a small island on the edge of Europe. An often wet, windy, place facing out into the Atlantic. It's beautiful and, if you ever leave and come back you realise just how it is very, very green. It's distinctively itself with a long cultural history. The world is more different now though than even twenty years ago. Due to communication advancements and technology what happens in New York happens in Newtownmountkennedy too. For good or for bad, take your pick, we're interconnected in ways unimaginable even a decade ago. Loud, noisy, insistent, the modern world is in rural Cork as much as it is in Chicago. Which is why, in an increasingly tense, unstable world, even apparently slight things can take on a much larger echo. We are, much to our detriment, becoming increasingly inured to the crass and rash things the President of the United States says. He has clearly operated along the principle of saying the unsayable so often that it becomes everyday. He utters the shocking thing so much that we are no longer shocked. With a world teetering on God-only-knows-what one more little cruel aside from a man dedicated to such sayings can appear utterly trivial. It shows, though, the bar at which we now operate. Not only that but this casual cruelty leaks everywhere now. It sets the tone. In response to the shocking shooting dead of two politicians in Minnesota Trump was asked if he would call the Governor there to, presumably, sympathise and offer support. This was his response. 'I think the Governor of Minnesota is so whacked out. I'm not calling him. Why would I call him? The guy doesn't have a clue. He's a mess. So I could be nice and call him. But why waste time?' What is most disturbing about this is not that Trump would say such a thing, such an utterly cruel thing, but that we now think so little of it that it doesn't even come anywhere near a headline. One of the enduringly fine things about Ireland is the way society works. We have problems, of course, prejudice, bigotry, we have unpleasant people, people you just want to avoid. We're not the Hollywood Ireland of smiling leprechauns and rainbows. Ireland is a just a country like any other country. A place like every other, full of the whole gamut of humanity. What we do have, though, is a society that works. Yes, we have enormous housing problems, enormous health inequalities, we do a lot of things in a way that I would disagree with intensely. But on an everyday level society works. It works because people treat each other with understanding and patience and kindness. Of course, there are exceptions to this too but the overall impression you get from interactions in Irish society is that people are friendly and considerate. It might sound trivial but it is the very thing that oils society along, that makes it work, that makes life pleasant. It is not trivial but essential. In everyday discourse, for instance, people are calm and obliging. It is not nothing. If, for instance, we conducted ourselves the way people do online, the President of the United States, for instance, who behaves like an online troll, what would that be like? If we engaged in endless petty resentments and regurgitated vitriol and an inability to display civility even at the most extreme moments, what would that be like? Isn't that the worry? Our culture is now so influenced by outside, technologically inspired, behaviours it has to be a concern that one of the planet's most influential men is like this. Not so long ago teachers expressed concern about the influence of online influencers on young Irish men in particular. What if our culture becomes open to the idea that this casual cruelty and arrogance is the way we should conduct ourselves? Ireland's smallness and geography has shaped the country and the people. Technology makes so much of that irrelevant. It makes us vulnerable to things we wouldn't have imagined. How ironic that people fear the country will be changed by the immigrant family down the road working hard for a better life but not by the loudmouths yelling awfulness through the devices they always have with them.
RTÉ News
2 hours ago
- RTÉ News
Russia hits Ukraine with large number of drone strikes
Russia hit Kyiv with the largest drone attack of the war, injuring at least 23 people and damaging buildings across the capital, according to officials. Air raid sirens, the sound of kamikaze drones and booming detonations reverberated from early evening until dawn as Russia launched what Ukraine's Air Force said was a total of 539 drones and 11 missiles. Residents huddled with families in underground metro stations for shelter during the attack, which happened only hours after US President Donald Trump spoke with Russia's Vladimir Putin. Following the call, the Kremlin said that the Russian leader told Mr Trump that Moscow will not "give up" on its aims in Ukraine while pledging it will also keep up a negotiating process on the conflict. President Volodymyr Zelensky, who is due to speak to Mr Trump later about the war and a US pause in some deliveries of air defence missiles, called the attack "deliberately massive and cynical". "Notably, the first air raid alerts in our cities and regions yesterday began to blare almost simultaneously with media reports discussing a phone call between President Trump and Putin," Mr Zelensky said in a post on X. "Yet again, Russia is showing it has no intention of ending the war and terror," he added, calling for increased pressure on Russia and more air defence equipment. Kyiv officials said the attack damaged about 40 apartment blocks, passenger railway infrastructure, five schools and kindergartens, cafes and many cars in six of Kyiv's ten districts. Poland said the consular section of its embassy was damaged in central Kyiv, adding that staff were unharmed. Mayor Vitali Klitschko said on Telegram that 14 of the injured were hospitalised. Ukraine's state-owned railway Ukrzaliznytsia, the country's largest carrier, said on Telegram that the attack on Kyiv forced them to divert a number of passenger trains, causing delays. Damage was recorded on both sides of the wide Dnipro River bisecting the city and falling drone debris set a medical facility on fire in the leafy Holosiivskyi district, Mr Klitschko said. Russian air strikes on Kyiv have intensified in recent weeks and included some of the deadliest assaults of the war on the city of three million people. Call for sanctions Mr Trump said that the call with Mr Putin resulted in no progress at all on efforts to end the war, while the Kremlin reiterated that Moscow would keep pushing to solve the conflict's "root causes". A decision by Washington earlier this week to halt some shipments of critical weapons to Ukraine prompted warnings by Kyiv that the move would weaken its ability to defend against intensifying airstrikes and battlefield advances. Mr Zelensky has called for increased pressure on Moscow to change its "dumb, destructive behaviour". "For every such strike against people and human life, they must feel appropriate sanctions and other blows to their economy, their revenues, and their infrastructure," he said. Ukraine's Air Force said that it destroyed 478 of the air weapons Russia launched overnight. However, air strikes were recorded in eight locations across the country with nine missiles and 63 drones, it added. Social media videos showed people running to seek shelter, firefighters fighting blazes in the dark and ruined buildings with windows and facades blown out. Both sides deny targeting civilians in the war that Russia launched with a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Thousands of civilians have died in the conflict, the vast majority of them Ukrainian. Many more soldiers are believed to have died on the frontlines, although neither side releases military casualty figures. Late yesterday, Russian shelling killed five people in and near the eastern Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk, a key target under Russian attack for months, Ukraine said. Meanwhile, Russia has announced a fresh swap of prisoners of war with Ukraine, saying it was part of agreements reached between Moscow and Kyiv during talks in Istanbul last month. Russia's defence ministry said Kyiv handed over a "group of Russian servicemen" and that Moscow "handed a group of Ukrainian soldiers in return". It did not say how many soldiers were exchanged.
Irish Times
2 hours ago
- Irish Times
Russia launches record 550 drones and ballistic missiles at Kyiv in night-time raid
Ukraine has accused Vladimir Putin of 'publicly humiliating' Donald Trump after Russia launched a record number of drones and ballistic missiles on Kyiv, hours after the two leaders spoke by phone. Volodymyr Zelenskiy described the seven-hour raid as a 'deliberate act of terror' which 'immediately followed the call between Washington and Moscow'. It was one of the most severe assaults of the war and a 'clear interpretation of how Moscow interprets diplomacy', he added. The sustained and co-ordinated night-time attack involved more than 550 Russian drones and ballistic missiles – a record. Families in Kyiv spent the night in metro stations, bedding down on the platform, as well as in basements and underground parking garages. Drones could be heard circling the skies above the Ukrainian capital, with a distinctive moped-like whine, one after another. There were numerous booms and explosions, and the staccato rattle of machine-gun fire, as Ukrainian air defence units tried to shoot the missiles down. READ MORE The air raid ended at 9am local time. A thick pall of choking black smoke hung over the city. Residents were advised to keep their windows shut because of numerous fires. According to officials, at least 23 people were injured, 14 of whom were taken to hospital. Blasts damaged apartment blocks, cars and warehouses. There was also disruption to the normally reliable rail network. Passengers arriving at Kyiv's main station on Thursday night had to file out through underground tunnels, with the main concourse closed and many services on Friday delayed. Speaking after his conversation with Mr Putin on Thursday, Mr Trump said they had discussed the war 'in a pretty long call'. But he said there was no movement towards a ceasefire, with Mr Putin reportedly insisting on Ukraine's capitulation. 'I'm not happy about that. No, I didn't make any progress with him today at all,' Mr Trump said. Thursday's grim attack came after the Pentagon this week halted the delivery of some weapons shipments to Ukraine, including replacement interceptor missiles used in Patriot air defence systems. Ukrainians have said the decision leaves their cities defenceless, emboldens Russia and facilitates deadly attacks. The Ukrainian government has been careful not to criticise the US president directly. But it wants Washington and other allies including the UK and EU to put further pressure on Moscow to stop the war and its relentless aerial attacks on civilians. Residents console each other after a Russian air strike in Kyiv, Ukraine, on Friday, July 4th, 2025. Photograph: Andrew Kravchenko/Bloomberg 'There must be consequences – not eventually, but now,' Mr Zelenskiy said. He stressed: 'Strengthened sanctions. Immediate delivery of air defence systems. A shift from caution to clarity. The Kremlin is watching the world's reaction. So are others.' Mr Zelenskiy said on Thursday that he hoped to speak with Mr Trump on Friday about the supply of US weapons, amid few expectations of a change in White House policy. One senior Ukrainian official suggested that Mr Trump's apparent strategy of appeasing Mr Putin was not working. Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to the head of Mr Zelenskiy's office, said any phone call with Mr Putin 'inevitably results in massive demonstrative shelling of Kyiv – with enormous destruction'. Mr Putin treated these conversations as 'an opportunity to publicly humiliate the other side's reputation'. It was a 'way to demonstrate his [Putin's] boundlessness and willingness to kill ever more brazenly,' Mr Podolyak posted on social media. With supplies of anti-aircraft missiles running low, Ukraine is increasingly using home-produced drones to take down incoming Shahed missiles. But it is struggling to cope with the overwhelming numbers flooding its skies. According to the Ukrainian air force, 72 out of 550 drones and missiles hit their targets in Thursday's massive raid. The attack was the latest in a series of Russian air strikes on Kyiv that have intensified in recent weeks and included some of the deadliest assaults of the war on the city of three million people. Ukraine, meanwhile, launched a drone attack on the city of Sergiyev Posad near Moscow, injuring at least one person and with explosions reported in at least four locations, the head of the district Oksana Yerokhanova said early on Friday. 'I ask everyone to remain calm, not to approach the windows, not to photograph the work of the air defence,' Yerokhanova wrote in a post on the Telegram messaging app. Another drone attack on the southern Russian region of Rostov region killed at least one woman, the acting governor of the region, Yury Slyusar, said on Telegram early on Friday. – Guardian
