They probably would have stopped him - Because it is illegal, and has been ruled illegal many of times before. Everytime A past administration has tried to tariff our lumber... It went to the WTO who ruled in our favor, and USA was found to be breaking NAFTA. They had to pony up a pretty penny in penalties and drop their tariff.
Canada is taking it up with WTO again - However part of UMCA's agreement is Canada drops their complaint, and usa will remove the tariffs - I think trump put them on to get better bargaining power when he re-negotiated the deal. Whether it worked or not, I don't know.
What I do know is one reason UMCA took so long to have Canada agree to it, a lot of people and companies lobbied the government asking them why sign a new deal, if the USA cant be trusted to uphold the current deal...Especially when USA wanted to remove the option for disputes with the WTO, like we've had to do with lumber in the past and won. I know a sticking point for us signing was they remove that clause and allow for disputes... Not sure if they did, or if Canada caved... I'll probably look it up though because it'd be interesting to see.
So what he did makes other countries not believe America is capable of good faith negotiations / treaties. And it works both ways - I strongly believe china should have even higher tariffs, I think countries should be self sufficient... You guys should have all your manufacturing back instead of to a foreign country - You cant compete with $2 an hour wages of another Country... it's unfair, and something needs to be done with it.
However.... while some businesses are coming back to USA, a great deal wont even consider it - Not because it's not proffitable... But because in 1 year, who's to say the democrats don't come in and remove the tarrifs, or take away the tax breaks, or make their 10 billion dollar investment worthless the day a new president gets put into office? That's the problem with executive privilege orders. Obama made a ton of them, and trump over turned most. Now trump is making a ton of them...such as these tarrifs and company incentives... and guess whats going to happen when the next government gets put into office? And the cycle continues, and nothing is consistant.
Had it been through the proper channels... it'd be more of a law and harder to over turn. (A US Law that would still get shot down in WTO... but still a law the next president couldnt just throw out) This goes back to my having a divided country is good for no one - It provides unstableness, and when a CEO can't be sure his billion dollar investment isn't going to get thrown away in a year, he's not going to invest. When I was a kid there was some give and take... Republicans didn't want xx, but so long as they got X They would vote for it. Now nothing gets done unless it's by executive order...
I don't agree with a lot of stuff both sides have done. But hey, I don't agree with a lot of stuff my boss does either... And on occasion it turns out pretty good. But if I dug my foot in the ground and refused to even try, nothing would get accomplished... I think that is Americas biggest problem now... Not Trump, not pelosi, But the fact both sides refuse to work together.
And sorry
Usually I despise and try to stay away from political threads, and here I am writing paragraph afetr paragraph about