Trump announces new tariffs on trucks, furniture and pharmaceuticals

The Washington Post – Friday, September 26, 2025
By Andrew Jeong and Victoria Craw

President Donald Trump announced new tariffs on heavy trucks, furniture and pharmaceutical products late Thursday, saying the levies will take effect Oct. 1.

In a post on social media, Trump said the new tariff for heavy trucks would be 25 percent and would seek to help companies such as Peterbilt, Kenworth, Freightliner and Mack trucks. New import taxes of 50 percent will be imposed on “all Kitchen Cabinets, Bathroom Vanities, and associated products,” Trump added. Upholstered furniture will be subject to a 30 percent rate, he said.

“Branded or patented” pharmaceutical products may face a rate of 100 percent, Trump also said in a separate post. However, he suggested drug companies that are building plants in the United States could face lower tariffs.

The fresh tariffs add to a cloud of uncertainty on trade policy, according to analysts, as major trade partners such as Canada, Mexico, China and South Korea continue trade negotiations and as U.S. courts weigh the legality of some of Trump’s earlier tariffs.

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“Like all of the tariff announcements we’ve seen this year, the impact of the new tariffs … will hinge on their implementation,” said Brett House, a professor at the Columbia Business School whose research focuses on macroeconomics and international finance. “It’s unclear, for instance, whether these new taxes on [U.S.] consumers and businesses will be levied in addition to already-established tariffs on … major trading partners and in contravention of existing trade deals.”

“At the margin, these tariffs and the uncertainty around them will add to inflationary pressures and dampen investment and growth further,” he added.

The new import taxes come on the heels of creeping inflation. Americans are paying more for appliances, home furnishings, toys and shoes than they were a few months ago. Key monthly costs such as those for shelter, food, health care and electricity are outpacing inflation. August inflation jumped to its highest rate since January, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Climbing jobless claims are fueling worries about stagflation — a combination of higher prices and higher unemployment.

Furniture prices have been accelerating faster than overall inflation, according to BLS tallies. Seasonally adjusted inflation for living room, kitchen and dining room furniture was 0.7 percent in August, higher than overall inflation for the third consecutive month.

While prices for new trucks have climbed more slowly than overall inflation during the same period, the new tariffs risk reversing that trend.

The tariff on pharmaceutical drugs, although lower than the 250 percent rate that Trump has touted, raises the possibility of increased health insurance costs.

In a May letter to the Commerce Department, the American Hospital Association warned that tariffs would significantly affect drug prices, noting that the U.S. obtains nearly 30 percent of its active pharmaceutical ingredients from China. It also cited a survey indicating that many health care experts expect tariff-related expenses to increase hospital costs by at least 15 percent. Some insurers have said that expected tariffs were raising insurance prices.

Trump noted that this tariff on pharmaceutical drugs would include exemptions, and drug manufacturers expressed concern but said exposure to major companies would be low.

Trump wrote on Truth Social: “Starting Oct. 1, 2025, we will be imposing a 100% Tariff on any branded or patented Pharmaceutical Product, unless a Company IS BUILDING their Pharmaceutical Manufacturing Plant in America. ‘IS BUILDING’ will be defined as, ‘breaking ground’ and/or ‘under construction.’ There will, therefore, be no Tariff on these Pharmaceutical Products if construction has started. Thank you for your attention to this matter!”

Most medicine prescribed in America is already made within the U.S., Alex Schriver, senior vice president of public affairs at the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, a major industry trade group, said in a statement. U.S. drugmakers “continue to announce hundreds of billions in new U.S. investments thanks to President Trump’s pro-growth … policies,” he said. But tariffs risk upending those investments, he said.

Many large drugmakers “should not be exposed because they are engaged in some sort of U.S. facility construction activity,” David Risinger, an analyst at Leerink Partners, wrote in a note to clients Thursday night.

But Trump’s post raises questions, he added, about whether the new stance is a negotiating tactic, how “under construction” will be defined and whether such an action could withstand legal challenges.

Trump’s reference to “branded or patented” pharmaceutical products in his post also indicated that tariffs would not be applied to generic medication, which have the same active ingredients as brand-name medicines and are only approved after brand-name products have been on the market for an exclusive amount of time. Generics fill 90 percent of prescriptions in the U.S., according to data from the Association for Accessible Medicine from 2020. Many cheap generic drugs are made in India and China.

In a statement, European Union trade spokesman Olof Gill said he expected tariffs on E.U. pharmaceutical companies to be capped at 15 percent, given the “clear all-inclusive 15% tariff ceiling for E.U. exports” agreed in the recent trade deal between the U.S. and E.U.

The Trump administration this week formalized its trade deal with the E.U., confirming it was lowering its auto tariffs to 15 percent for cars from the bloc. The skeletal deal caps tariffs on most E.U. goods at 15 percent and includes exemptions for certain products such as aircraft, while leaving other disputes up to further negotiations. The E.U. is still trying to secure carve-outs for other key sectors such as steel and wine.

Some European pharmaceutical companies and trade groups also pointed to the trade agreement, or expressed hope the impact of the tariffs would be limited.

Novo Nordisk, the Danish company that makes the weight-loss drug Wegovy, said in a statement that it was already expanding its manufacturing site in North Carolina, and said that “while it is not yet clear how today’s announcement relates to the EU/US trade agreement,” the firm looked forward to continuing work with the Trump administration.

The European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations also pointed out that “the E.U. and U.S. already have a trade agreement in place,” adding that “urgent discussions are needed on how to avoid any tariffs on medicines that harm patients” and that tariffs on medicines would “create the worst of all worlds.”

Meanwhile, the Canadian Chamber of Commerce warned that “medicine is not just another commodity” and that steep tariffs could “lead to immediate price hikes, strained insurance systems, hospital shortages, and the real risk of patients rationing or foregoing essential medicines. For these very reasons, medical products have historically been spared from aggressive trade measures,” Pascal Chan, a vice president with the group, said in a statement.

“Even if pharmaceutical manufacturing were to reshore to the U.S., significant delays, bureaucratic hurdles, and increased costs — exacerbated by existing tariffs on materials like steel and aluminum — would make the rapid domestic ramp-up the U.S. administration wants impossible,” he added.

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