Trump rejects EU offer to scrap car tariffs

The US president also says the WTO is ‘the single worst trade deal ever made.’

U.S. President Donald Trump said the EU’s offer to scrap tariffs on cars is “not good enough” because European consumers’ “habits are to buy their cars, not to buy our cars.”

In an interview with Bloomberg published Friday, Trump also said the EU “is almost as bad as China, just smaller.”

On Thursday, EU trade chief Cecilia Malmström told European Parliament’s trade committee that Brussels is willing to scrap tariffs on all industrial products, including cars, in its trade talks with the United States.

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“We are willing to bring down even our car tariffs down to zero … if the U.S. does the same,” she said, adding that “it would be good for us economically, and for them.”

Trump also took aim at the World Trade Organization, telling Bloomberg: “If they don’t shape up, I would withdraw from the WTO,” adding that the agreement establishing the body is “the single worst trade deal ever made.”

The U.S. president said his country has “rarely won a lawsuit” in the WTO, “except for last year.”

He said: “In the last year, we’re starting to win a lot. You know why? Because they know if we don’t, I’m out of there.”

According to Bloomberg, of the 54 cases brought by the U.S. over the life of the WTO, Washington won at least one finding in its favor in 49 of them, and of the 80 cases brought against the U.S., a WTO panel ruled against it in at least one aspect in 69 cases.