Trump Posts Tariff Letters Setting Rates Up to 40% and Pushes His Own Deadline to Aug. 1

On July 7, 2025, President Trump began posting form letters on Truth Social notifying foreign leaders of the tariff rates their countries would face, starting with 25 percent on Japan and South Korea and expanding over the week to roughly two dozen countries and the European Union, with rates ranging from 20 to 50 percent. The same day he signed an executive order moving the expiration of the tariff pause from July 9 to August 1. The letters were largely identical, told each government the United States "has agreed to continue working with" it despite a trade deficit, and generally did not identify the practices a country would have to change. Trade economist Douglas Irwin called the approach "extremely broad brush."

The mechanism departed sharply from ordinary trade practice: rates set by social-media letter rather than negotiated agreement or published rulemaking, and a deadline the administration had set for itself moved rather than met. Officials had earlier promised roughly 90 trade deals in 90 days; by early July only two, with the United Kingdom and Vietnam, had been announced.

The rates largely took effect in August 2025. The Brazil letter, which cited the prosecution of former president Jair Bolsonaro rather than trade grounds, is covered separately in this ledger.