Eric Ham: More U.S. tariffs underscore Trump’s insatiable appetite for a global trade war

U.S. President Donald Trump speaks as C.C. Wei, chairman and CEO of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, right, and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick listen in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington, Monday, March 3, 2025. (Pool via AP)

Eric Ham is based in Washington, D.C. and is a political analyst for CTV News. He’s a bestselling author and former congressional staffer in the U.S. Congress and writes for CTVNews.ca.

The Trump administration filed notice on Monday that it had begun an investigation into whether imports of medicines including pharmaceutical ingredients, along with semiconductor chips, threaten America’s national security.

This is an effort to lay the groundwork for more stinging tariffs on foreign-made drugs and semiconductors.

Even amid the still simmering imbroglio stemming from his Liberation Day tariff pronouncement, the twice-impeached convicted felon makes clear, his hunger for greater carnage and chaos has not been satiated.

Markets still have not fully rebounded from the president’s recent pause. Moreover, C-suite executives, hedge fund managers and more are bracing for the next policy grenade the mercurial commander-in-chief will set off. The president is attempting to foment even more uncertainty and more doubt in a global economy already rife with entirely too much.

Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon said in a statement recently that the climate is a “markedly different operating environment than earlier this year.” The banking giant went further, saying on a call with analysts, “The prospect of a recession has increased with growing indications that economic activity is slowing down.” He went on to add, “Our clients, including corporate CEOs and institutional investors, are concerned by the significant near-term and longer-term uncertainty that has constrained their ability to make important decisions.”

Fellow industry titan, JPMorgan Chase CEO Jaime Dimon, offered an equally demoralizing prognosis. He stated, “The economy is facing considerable turbulence (including geopolitics), with the potential negatives of tariffs and ‘trade wars,’ ongoing sticky inflation, high fiscal deficits and still rather high asset prices and volatility.”

Financial oracles shedding any pretense that a self-inflicted wound, orchestrated by the White House, has sent a once optimal economy into a tailspin. Yet, the president is still clamoring for more, even as industry leaders, consumers and nations signal their tolerance for enduring more is at an end.

The U.S. Commerce Department is now reviewing the semiconductor industry for potential tariffs, which could see a massive growth industry come crashing to an abrupt halt. The U.S. microchip business, which is currently valued at just under US$700 billion, had been expected to see a massive leap to more than US$2 trillion by 2032.

• Complete coverage of the Trump tariffs

However, now that the White House is considering import duties on the industry, the once-promising sector could see massive domestic investment, global partnerships, and vital supply chains dramatically altered. U.S. President Donald Trump’s new tariffs could cost American semiconductor equipment makers more than US$1 billion a year.

He has told industry leader, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), it would have to pay an astounding tax of 100 per cent if it did not build factories in the United States.The president’s war on trade has already cost the nation prestige, wealth, and reputation. Yet, in raising the stakes, Donald Trump is showcasing his boundless desire for maximum hurt both at home and abroad.

Initially, import duties on steel, aluminum and automotive products cast a pall over America’s manufacturing sector as the taxes were like a sledgehammer to an industry that accounts for 10 per cent of the nation’s GDP.

Effects on pharmaceuticals

Now, however, with the precious semiconductor and pharmaceutical industries staring down the gauntlet of more debilitating tariffs, the White House could be preparing for the kill shot that takes down the nation as well as its closest economic alliances from Canada to Asia.

In fact, Canada’s pharmaceutical sector is among the global top 10 national markets, holding a two per cent share of the total global market. Moreover, more than 50 per cent of Canadian pharmaceutical products are exported, with the U.S. as the largest destination.

Generic drug manufacturers have had to contend with increasing competition and tight profit margins in recent years. Slapping extra costs through tariffs could undermine their ability to do business with the U.S., especially since it could be tougher for them to recoup the added expense than manufacturers of brand-name drugs.

Currently, there are 270 active drug shortages in the U.S., down from an all-time high of 323 in early 2024, according to the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists. Shortages of antibiotics are a particular problem. Equally confounding is the White House issuance of a recent Executive Order aimed at lowering drug prices and reducing costs for Medicare. Again, another glaring example of the inconsistency in the policy implementation by a president sending competing messages creating confusion and maximum turbulence.

It has often been said that misery loves company. President Trump’s on-again, off-again, trade war now has no shortage of bedfellows. Heads of state are scrambling to find balance and equanimity. Industries are desperate to secure alternative markets beyond America; and consumers at home and abroad remain numb to the fallout. Yet, through it all, President Trump remains steadfast, determined, even dogmatic in both his thinking and approach to more, not less, dubiety.

A one-man wrecking machine, President Trump has single-handedly brought the global collective of economic engines, minds, and institutions to heel. His reputation, world renown for never enough, and now, all corners of the globe are learning this fateful and expensive lesson the hard way. In Trump’s hands, he has unlocked, unified, and galvanized the entire weight of American hegemony at his fingertips.

Now the world waits with bated breath to its unleashing. Ordinary people crushed; industry upon industry demoralized; nation after nation demeaned. With every ignominious failure a voracious appetite unrequited. Each crash, each disaster, each deleterious end begets more of the same. More failures. More flops. More losses. And at its core, at its foundation, a thirst for destruction that can never be quenched.