Bigger news about tariffs

The May 23 front page headline shouted “Tariff rollback thrills growers to core.” But this headline presents a somewhat unbalanced view of the Trump trade war’s impact on Washington state agriculture. A more appropriate headline might have been: “Mexico apple tariff gone. China cherry tariff up 500%.”

The relief from apple tariffs in the Mexico market is indeed good news. But you should have pointed out that Trump’s recent escalation of the trade war with China has set off a counterattack of Chinese retaliatory tariffs aimed broadly at USA farm products nationwide, including the full spectrum of Washington’s agricultural products.

So things might perk up in the apple industry, but nearly every other sector of Washington agriculture is hurting in Trump’s “easy to win” trade war that he downplays as a “scuffle.” So far Trump has been scuffling since January of 2018.

After 16 months, this “scuffle” feels more like an entrenched “siege” because it’s costing us billions, with no end in sight.

Steve McNutt

Spokane