Trump seeks 20% tax on Mexican imports to build border wall

January 27, 2017

Washington, Jan 27: President Donald Trump is seeking to impose a 20 per cent tax on imports from countries which has a trade deficit with the US like Mexico in order to finance the construction of a border wall along its southern border, the White House said. This is one of the way to pay for the wall that the US is planning to construct along the US-Mexico border.

TrumptaxHowever the proposal is currently only for Mexico, White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer told reporters travelling with the Trump from Philadelphia to Washington DC abroad Air Force One. "When you look at the plan that's taking shape now, using comprehensive tax reform as a means to tax imports from countries that we have a trade deficit from, like Mexico," Spicer said.

"If you tax that USD 50 billion at 20 per cent of imports, which is by the way a practice that 160 other countries do -– right now, our country's policy is to tax exports and let imports flow freely in, which is ridiculous. By doing it that way we can do USD 10 billion a year and easily pay for the wall just through that mechanism alone," Spicer said.

"Right now we are focused on Mexico, but I think as we look comprehensively at our trade situation and countries that we have a deficit for, this is something the president has been talking about holistically," he said. "He has talked about a border tax. In particular companies that move out, ship things back in. But in this case, this really handles, is focused more on the immigration piece," Spicer said.

"Remember, keep in mind there are 160 other countries that do just this. We are one of the only major countries, in fact probably the only major country that doesn't treat imports this way," Spicer said. "In fact, we currently tax exports, not imports. This gets us in line frankly with the policies that the other countries around the world treat our products," he said.

"If you think about what a border tax on imports from countries like Mexico that we have a huge trade deficit does, that's really going to provide the funding," he added.

"But the other net positive that you have to realise is that through the wall, not only do we secure our border but I think we are going to save additional money that we would have had to spend on tracking down illegal immigrants and on immigration," Spicer said making a strong case for a physical barrier across the US-Mexico border.

Meanwhile, Spicer said the 20 per cent tax plan to be imposed on imports from countries with trade deficit like Mexico was in early stages and nothing has been finalised yet. The tax plan is in its "early stages," Spicer said. The President was really excited to see the level of support that both houses showed for his nominees, for his plan, for his desire to put America's security first," he said. Spicer said the President is still talking with the Republican leadership in the Congress.

"I don't think our job right now is to roll something out and or be prescriptive, it's to show that there are ways the wall can be paid for. Full stop," Spicer said in response to a question. "The idea was, there have been questions about how the President could pay for the wall. And the idea that, one idea through comprehensive tax reform is that there could be this idea that Speaker (Paul) Ryan and others have floated that through tax reform you could actually look at imports with countries that we have a trade deficit for, that can generate revenue," Spicer said.

"The idea is to show that generating revenue for the wall is not as difficult as some might have suggested. One measure alone could do this. So as we move forward the idea today wasn't rolling it out or being prescriptive or announce anything, it's to say hey look, it's not that hard to do," he said. Spicer said there is nothing to be rolled out yet.

"There's nothing to roll out so the idea of asking for details on something, we're not there yet. It could be a multitude of things," he said. "Instead of 20 per cent it could be 18, it could be five. But the idea is to say that for all the 'how could this ever happen,' it's to say 'okay, here's one idea that gets it done really easy. That's the idea, that there is a way that easily does this," Spicer said.

"You can do things in a very WTO-compliant way, but I'm not here to roll out a policy... Hypothetically yes, there are several things you can do and be compliant. You can say any country but if you look at just Mexico alone you can do that very easily," he added.

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Agencies
January 25,2020

Washington, Jan 25: US President Donald Trump's legal team was preparing his defence on Saturday after the Democratic prosecutors ended their marathon 24-hour argument to oust him from office during the Senate trial.

In the arguments spread over three days ending on Friday, the Democrat prosecutors from the House of Representatives that had impeached Trump last month, mostly rehashed the testimonies from the hearings before their committees during the investigation and statements in their chamber.

Like the Democrats' arguments, the Trump defence's counter-arguments, also with 24 hours allotted for it, will be mind-numbing monologues for the most part and the real drama will be on a tussle between the two parties on calling witnesses.

The Democrats failed in their repeated attempts on the first day of the trial on January 28 to include calling testimonies from witnesses in the rules of procedure, but they will get another chance to press their case when the defence rests.

There is a tense wait speckled with speculations to see if the Democrats can get four Republicans to defect and vote to call witnesses after failing to sway a mass defection to get the two-thirds majority to convict Trump.

Trump is charged with abuse of power and obstruction of Congress in the trial presided over by Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts with the Senators acting as jurors.

As the time allotted for the prosecution wound down on Friday, the leading prosecutor, Adam Schiff, demanded that the Republican-controlled Senate convict and remove Trump from office, because he was an "imminent threat" to the US and the nation could not wait for the election to throw him out.

Schiff, who heads the House Intelligence Committee that investigated Trump, gave them a personal warning: "No matter how close you are to this president, do you think for a moment that if he felt it was in his interest, he wouldn't ask you to be investigated?

Jerry Nadler, the head of the Judicial Committee that framed the charges in the impeachment, called Trump a "dictator".

Instead of a full sitting of eight hours, the defence will present its case for only two to three hours on Saturday in what Trump's lawyer Jay Sekulow called a "trailer (for) coming attractions" in the defence counterarguments.

They will get to use their remaining time next week.

The shorter session starting with fuller presentations next week is partly a concession to media savvy Trump who tweeted that daytime Saturday when his defence was slated is a "death valley" on TV as few viewers would watch a political event at that time.

With Trump certain to be acquitted because the Democrats do not have the two-thirds vote, the impeachment process and the Senate trial are only meant to be an extended media show in their campaign for the November election.

The Democrats want to spiff up the TV spectacle by calling former National Security Adviser John Bolton and Trump's acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney as witnesses.

Trump could exercise his executive privilege to stop them from testifying, in which case they could go to court to compel their appearance at the Senate trial extending its duration by months if not weeks.

The House charged him with obstruction of Congress because he refused to allow some of this staff to testify and release documents requested by the House investigators.

The Republicans, who want a quick end to the trial, can also counter the Democrats' request for witnesses by calling former Vice President Joe Biden and his son, Hunter, to testify in order to embarrass them and their party.

The Bidens are at the root of the abuse of power charges against Trump.

Trump had asked newly-elected Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelentsky in a July phone call to investigate the Bidens' dealings in his country as a "favour".

Democrats say that this was inviting foreign intervention in US elections because Joe Biden is the leading Democratic party candidate for the nomination to oppose him.

Moreover, they say that he froze about $400 million in Congressionally-approved military aid for pressure Zelentsky to order the probe and this endangered US national security as Ukraine is at war with Russia.

chiff and the other prosecutors said delaying the aid was an attempt at a quid pro quo.

Zelentsky has said that he did not feel pressured by Trump.

Hunter Biden, who was removed from the Navy allegedly due to drug use and had no energy business experience landed a directorship in a Ukrainian gas company with monthly payments reportedly between $50,000 and $83,000 while his father was overseeing Washington's dealings with Kiev.

The former Vice President has publicly admitted that he got the Ukrainian leaders to fire the prosecutor investigating his son's company.

The Republicans have said that the son's appointment was unethical and the father had the prosecutor removed to protect his son's company.

In their arguments, the Democratic prosecutors said there was nothing wrong in Hunter Biden getting the job and his father had the prosecutor dismissed because he was corrupt.

The defence team is expected to assert that Trump withheld the aid because he wanted to be sure that the new government was not corrupt and the aid was released without a probe.

Anticipating the argument, Schiff said that Trump had allowed the aid to go forward only because it became known and his intent still made him guilty.

In another development impinging on the Trump case, a secret recording said to be of the president ordering the firing of Marie Yovanovitch as US ambassador to Ukraine in 2018 has surfaced.

She was one of the witnesses at the House investigations of the charges against Trump.

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News Network
July 10,2020

Lahore, Jul 10: The Punjab government enforced smart lockdown in seven cities of the province for 15 days with an immediate effect from Thursday night, The News International reported.

The Primary and Secondary Healthcare Department on Thursday issued a notification under the Punjab Infectious Diseases Ordinance 2020, about enforcement of lockdown in Lahore, Multan, Faisalabad, Gujranwala, Sialkot, Gujrat and Rawalpindi, till July 24 midnight.

In Lahore, the lockdown will be enforced in A2 Block Township, EME Society, Main Bazaar Chungi Amr Sadhu, Punjab Government Servants Housing Scheme, Wapda Town, C-Block Jauhar Town and Green City.

The basic necessities of life will remain available in smart lockdown areas. "The purpose of the smart lockdown is to minimise movement of people in hotspots of positive coronavirus cases," said Capt (retd) Muhammad Usman, Secretary, Primary and Secondary Healthcare Department.

The country registered 2,751 new COVID-19 cases during the last 24 hours, taking the tally to 243,599 on Friday. The province-wise breakup includes 85,261 cases in Punjab, 100,900 cases in Sindh, 29,406 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 11,099 in Balochistan, 13,829 in Islamabad, 1,619 in Gilgit-Baltistan and 1,485 in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.

The death toll due to the virus reached 5,058 with 75 more deaths reported over the last 24 hours, as per data cited by Radio Pakistan.

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Agencies
May 19,2020

Washington DC, May 19: US President Donald Trump has threatened to permanently halt funding for the World Health Organisation (WHO) if it did not commit to improvements within 30 days, and to reconsider the membership of the United States in the global health body.

On Monday, Trump wrote a letter to WHO Director-General Tedros Ghebreyesus that read, "If WHO doesn't commit to major substantive improvements within the next 30 days, I will make my temporary freeze of US funding to WHO permanent and reconsider our membership in the organisation."

Trump had temporarily suspended US' contribution to the WHO last month, accusing it of promoting China's "disinformation" about the coronavirus outbreak, although WHO officials denied the accusation and Beijing said that it was transparent and open.

"The only way forward for the WHO is if it can actually demonstrate independence from China. My administration has already started discussions with you on how to reform the organisation. But action is needed quickly. 

We do not have time to waste," Trump said in the letter.

"I cannot allow American taxpayer dollars to continue to finance an organisation that, in its present state, is so clearly not serving America's interests," he added.

On Monday, the WHO said that an independent review of the global coronavirus response would begin at the earliest and it received backing from China, where the virus was first discovered.

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