Donald Trump raises a hand as he speaks animatedly to media.
Donald Trump speaking in the Roosevelt Room of the White House this week (Photo: ROBERTO SCHMIDT / AFP)

PoliticsMarch 5, 2025

Trump has reignited the tariff war – why? And what does it mean for New Zealand?

Donald Trump raises a hand as he speaks animatedly to media.
Donald Trump speaking in the Roosevelt Room of the White House this week (Photo: ROBERTO SCHMIDT / AFP)

‘Dumb idea’ or not, the reverberations are keenly felt as far away as the South Pacific. 

The white-knuckle opening episode of the second Trump presidency continues: fresh from a bizarre public flagellation of Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Potus has just pressed go on sweeping tariffs on Canada, Mexico and China – the three biggest US trading partners – sparking political outrage and market mayhem.

Wait, weren’t these tariffs suspended last month?

Yes. In February, President Trump agreed to a pause on promised blanket 25% tariffs that were to be imposed on Canada and Mexico, after undertakings were given on border controls relating to illegal immigration and drug trafficking. (A 10% tariff on Chinese imports was introduced, prompting Beijing to level a host of tariffs in response.)

But now, citing a lack of action on those undertakings, Trump has pushed the big tariff button, and doubled duties on imports from China to 20%.

How does Trump justify these moves?

An exercise in “punishment”.

He wants to make it “very costly for people to take advantage of this country”, he explained yesterday. “They can’t come in and steal our money and steal our jobs and take our factories and take our businesses and expect not to be punished. And they’re being punished by tariffs. It’s a very powerful weapon that politicians haven’t used because they were either dishonest, stupid, or paid off in some other form.”

How did the markets respond?

Not well. Amid predictions of a resulting spike in costs for US businesses and consumers, share markets started sweating. The Dow Jones index plunged, finishing the day down by more than 1.55%. 

There is a real risk of flow-on effect, too. According to one analyst, the impact on KiwiSaver accounts could be “pretty ugly”.

How have the countries targeted responded?

Justin Trudeau, who is in his final furlong as prime minister of Canada, said the tariffs amounted to “a very dumb thing to do”. Confirming an array of retaliatory duties, and promising more to come if there was not a backdown, Trudeau let rip. “Today, the United States launched a trade war against Canada,” he said at a press briefing. “At the same time, they’re talking about working positively with Russia, while appeasing Vladimir Putin, a lying, murderous dictator. Make that make sense.”

Trudeau appealed to US residents, saying they would feel the pain of these decisions in cost of living terms: “Your government has chosen to do this to you.” He also suggested that Trump was motivated by a wish to provoke an economic crisis for his northern neighbour and move in to annex the place.

That sounds deranged, conspiratorial.

It would sound that way, were it not for the fact that Trump has repeatedly talked about annexing Canada. 

What about Mexico and China?

China hit back with fresh tariffs of its own almost immediately. “By imposing unilateral tariffs, the US has violated WTO rules and disrupted the security and stability of the global industrial and supply chains,” said a Beijing spokesperson.

Mexican president Claudia Sheinbaum said she would be responding soon.

Is that it, or are there more tariffs on the cards?

That’s not it. Trump has warned there may be more to come, as part of his “America First” trade policy, and that the world should be on notice. Those previewed so far include wide-ranging new tariffs on agricultural products, automobiles and steel and aluminium. 

Surely this wouldn’t take in the friendly South Pacific nation of New Zealand?

Last time around, Trump imposed steel and aluminium tariffs across the board, with a handful of exemptions – New Zealand was not among them. Those tariffs remained in place under Joe Biden. Now there is a prospect of a hike in those duties as soon as next week. There are very real concerns, too, among New Zealand agriculture and food exporters. 

What have New Zealand politicians said about it all?

It’s a tricky one. There is a very real risk in offending the stable genius in the White House – as evidenced by the procession of tech oligarchs and foreign leaders going the other way and genuflecting humiliatingly at his feet to further their interests. 

Asked about the Zelenskyy debacle this week, Christopher Luxon said he trusts Trump and considers the US a reliable partner. He has previously declined invitations to condemn the president’s tariff tear.

Speaking this morning to RNZ, Chris Hipkins, leader of the Labour opposition, would not give a direct answer when asked if he trusted Trump. The main message from the tariff boilover, he said, was the importance of working harder to diversify New Zealand’s export markets. 

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And the foreign minister?

Appearing on Newstalk ZB this morning, Winston Peters was asked by Mike Hosking for a thought on the latest Trump headlines. “God,” said the broadcaster, “what a mess!” Peters let loose a laugh, saying, “Well, I think, Mr Hosking, it would be wise for me, in the interests of my country, to keep my mouth shut and wait until the dust settles.” The conversation then turned to Mongolian gift horses.

How about the experts?

Winston Peters is an expert, sunshine.

Sorry, the commentators and so on.

Robert Patman of Otago University counsels against the “stay off the Trump radar” approach. It is “naïve to believe this thoroughly transactional president will not demand major concessions from New Zealand in return for any exemption from US tariffs”, he wrote a couple of weeks ago. “Moreover, it is important that New Zealand, in the words of Christopher Luxon, ‘stands up for its values’ at a time when the Trump administration presents a grave threat to the sovereignty, freedom and prosperity of other liberal democracies.”

He concluded: “It may be tempting for New Zealand to keep its head down and hope for some sort of deal with Trump. That would be a grave strategic error and one Trump hopes our government will make. A better New Zealand strategy would be to reaffirm its friendship with America, but clearly indicate such friendship cannot come at the expense of Wellington’s long-standing commitment to free trade, the rules-based global order and its solidarity with states like Canada, Mexico and Denmark that share these values.”

And for a cheerful American take: speaking to the Wall Street Journal, Andrew Wilson, deputy secretary-general of the International Chamber of Commerce, thought Trump’s tactics could trigger something like, oh, you know, the Great Depression. “Our deep concern,” he said, “is that this could be the start of a downward spiral that puts us in 1930s trade-war territory.”

Keep going!
David Seymour shows he’s good at not taking criticism (or advice) to heart.
David Seymour shows he’s good at not taking criticism (or advice) to heart.

PoliticsMarch 5, 2025

Echo Chamber: David Seymour says ‘namaste’ to school lunch woes

David Seymour shows he’s good at not taking criticism (or advice) to heart.
David Seymour shows he’s good at not taking criticism (or advice) to heart.

Melted plastic in food? Pork for Muslim students? The grossest slop photos you’ve ever seen? David Seymour has one thing to say to the school lunch naysayers: namaste.

Echo Chamber is The Spinoff’s dispatch from the press gallery, recapping sessions in the House. Columns are written by politics reporter Lyric Waiwiri-Smith and Wellington editor Joel MacManus.

It sucks when you give something to people for free, out of the goodness of your own heart, and they can’t even muster up a “thank you”. This must be how associate education minister David Seymour is feeling right now, endlessly exposed to a barrage of “why are you giving kids disgusting lunches?” instead of “why can’t lazy parents express their freedom of choice and feed their own children?” Anyway, it seems there could be a new slogan for the coalition government on the horizon, courtesy of the soon-to-be-deputy-prime-minister – but we’ll get back to that.

Speaker Gerry Brownlee kicked off yesterday’s question time by making a decision on the use of “Aotearoa” in the House – you may remember this important plotline from sitting day episode 8, first teased in earlier episodes, in which Winston Peters went off on the Greens’ Ricardo Menéndez March for saying something something “Aotearoa”. Guided by the New Zealand Geographic Board’s approach, Brownlee ruled that Aotearoa is OK, other people don’t need to say it if they don’t like it, and Menéndez March might like to stick “New Zealand” at the end when he uses it.

“That really is the end of the matter,” Brownlee told the House. Peters had entered midway through, and deputy leader Shane Jones was in Canada, so only time will tell if NZ First’s top dogs got the memo.

Labour leader Chris Hipkins began Tuesday’s oral questions with the go-to line – “does the prime minister stand by all his blah blah blah” – before revealing his true motives: the coalition’s revamped school lunch programme, and the head chef behind it whom the opposition argues must get out of the kitchen: Seymour. If you have forgotten all 10,000 school lunch controversies since the programme relaunched two months ago, Hipkins summed it up this way: “feeding children melted plastic, failing to deliver lunches at all, serving up the same food 13 days in a row, or serving pork to halal students”. Now, Hipkins asked, will the government sort out the school lunch mess?

The speaker’s decision on the use of ‘Aotearoa’ in the House can be summarised as: if you like it, use it, if you don’t, don’t use it.

Luxon repeated advice he had shared via Newstalk ZB earlier that morning: “I just say to parents that may be listening to this, feel free to prepare a Marmite sandwich and an apple for lunch.” 

That kicked the barracking from the opposition benches up about 50 decibels. “That is the last mass outburst that we’re going to hear today,” the speaker warned. Little did he know, but easily could he have guessed, that was not to be the last mass outburst of the day.

When the Greens’ co-leader Marama Davidson rose for her oral question (which, evidently, was the same as Hipkins’), Luxon didn’t budge on his position, but he did get support. Peters interjected with a yells-at-clouds supplementary that wasn’t quite a question, but more a reminder of how long he’s been on the block. Has the government considered, he asked, that there were once very poor Māori schools who didn’t rely on the state and made the girls work in the kitchen to feed everyone? What about those good old days?

“I take objection from a number of people who get up and give their views … [on] events that they know nothing about – poverty: how it smells, how it feels, what it tastes like – and they show it every day in this House,” Peters, once a boy who walked to school barefoot or by horse and now a man on an annual salary of $354,100, said.

“Well, that was helpful,” Brownlee replied.

Labour’s spokesperson for education, Jan Tinetti, also had a go at scrutinising the government over school lunches and to his credit, Seymour did admit that “plastic containers melting into food is not a part of the programme”. But his long-winded response on quality control suggested a speaker’s warning for Seymour to keep his answers “concise” had fallen on deaf ears, and the Greens’ co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick was fed up with being fed word slop: “It’s ChatGPT at this point!”

Jan Tinetti at least tried to get an answer about the state of the school lunch programme.

Even if he’s struggling to deliver up-to-standard school lunches, Seymour is always ready to serve up a comeback. “If that member used ChatGPT, she’d make a lot more sense,” Seymour responded. “And ChatGPT doesn’t hallucinate as much as that member.”

Tinetti’s attempts at speaking truth to power hit a snag. Seymour embarrassed her by revealing it was Young Act who had provided the faux school lunch photo she later removed from social media, and claimed that in fact, many people would love these meals for lunch (just not the children who refuse to eat them).

“Now, a lot of people I know, if someone gave them butter chicken for free 13 times, they wouldn’t be complaining,” Seymour said. “They’d actually be thrilled. Namaste.”

So why, Tinetti implored, did Seymour miss a “please explain” meeting with education minister Erica Stanford if he’s so confident about his controversial lunch programme? Well, Seymour responded, the Act Party’s morning caucus meeting had run late, and expecting a group of “tight, busy and productive” people to be available for an urgent meeting is a big ask.

Head chef David Seymour speaks to the House.

And who chairs that caucus, interjected Willow-Jean Prime.

“Oh, the chairmanship of the Act caucus I’m being asked about now, Mr Speaker,” said Seymour. “I’ve got to say that I am a great admirer of David Seymour’s chairmanship.” At last, someone was singing his praises.