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President Donald Trump ordered the reimposition of tariffs on dozens of trading partners Thursday — his cornerstone strategy for reshaping global trade to benefit the US economy.However, in a minor reprieve that opens the door to further negotiations, the White House said these measures will take effect in a week, not Friday as previously expected.The tariffs are a demonstration of raw economic power that Trump sees putting US exporters in a stronger position while encouraging domestic manufacturing by keeping out foreign imports.But the muscular approach has raised fears of inflation and other economic fallout in the world’s biggest economy.And with questions hanging over the effectiveness of bilateral trade deals already struck — including with the European Union and Japan — the outcome of Trump’s plan remained uncertain.Trump’s new measures in an executive order raises duties on nearly 70 economies, from a current 10 percent level imposed in April when he unleashed “reciprocal” tariffs citing unfair trade practices.The steeper levels, varying by trading partner, go as high as 41 percent.Trump also adjusted some tariff levels threatened in April, with Switzerland now facing a higher 39 percent duty and Thailand a lower 19 percent rate.The tariff on Taiwanese products was revised down to 20 percent, but its President Lai Ching-te vowed to seek an even lower level.Trump separately hiked tariffs on Canadian goods to 35 percent, though indicating in an NBC interview he was open to further talks. Canada and Mexico face a separate tariff regime. But exemptions remain for imports entering the United States under a North American trade pact.”No doubt about it — the executive order and related agreements concluded over the past few months tears up the trade rule book that has governed international trade since World War II,” said Wendy Cutler, senior vice president of the Asia Society Policy Institute.”Whether our partners can preserve it without the United states is an open question,” she added.- Frantic negotiations -The elevated duties come after Washington twice postponed their implementation amid a frantic series of negotiations, alongside announcements of new duties and deals with partners.Just Thursday, Trump announced he was delaying a tariff hike on Mexican products, keeping levels at 25 percent with existing exemptions. The 90-day postponement followed talks with his counterpart Claudia Sheinbaum.The 79-year-old Republican has made tariffs core to his protectionist brand of hard-right politics. On Thursday, he claimed that the US economy had “no chance of survival or success” without tariffs.But the latest salvo came amid legal challenges against Trump’s use of emergency economic powers. After a lower court said the president exceeded his authority, the US Court of Appeals heard arguments Thursday in cases against Trump’s blanket tariffs targeting different countries.While Trump has touted a surge in customs revenues this year, economists warn the duties could fuel inflation.Proponents of his policy argue their impact will be one-off, but analysts are awaiting further data to gauge for more persistent effects.- China question mark -Those who managed to strike deals with Washington to avert steeper threatened levies were Vietnam, Japan, Indonesia, the Philippines, South Korea and the EU.Britain also reached a pact with the United States, although it was not originally targeted by higher “reciprocal” tariffs.For Canada, transshipped goods to evade its 35 percent duty would face even higher levels, said a White House fact sheet. Its trade ties with Washington faced renewed threat after Prime Minister Mark Carney announced plans to recognize a Palestinian state at the UN General Assembly in September.Trump’s latest order however appeared to raise tariffs on several countries not initially targeted in April — to 15 percent — including Ecuador, Ghana and Iceland.Notably excluded from the drama was China, which faces an August 12 deadline instead, when duties could bounce back to higher levels.Washington and Beijing at one point brought tit-for-tat tariffs to triple-digit levels, but both countries have agreed to temporarily lower these duties and are working to extend their truce.

Nvidia chips do not contain “backdoors” allowing remote access, the US tech giant has said, after Beijing summoned company representatives to discuss “serious security issues”.The California-based company is a world-leading producer of AI semiconductors, and this month became the first company to hit $4 trillion in market value.But it has become entangled in trade tensions between China and the United States, and Washington effectively restricts which chips Nvidia can export to China on national security grounds.”Cybersecurity is critically important to us. Nvidia does not have ‘backdoors’ in our chips that would give anyone a remote way to access or control them,” Nvidia said in a statement Thursday.A key issue has been Chinese access to the “H20” — a less powerful version of Nvidia’s AI processing units that the company developed specifically for export to China.Nvidia said this month it would resume H20 sales to China after Washington pledged to remove licensing curbs that had halted exports.But the tech giant still faces obstacles — US lawmakers have proposed plans to require Nvidia and other manufacturers of advanced AI chips to include built-in location tracking capabilities.Beijing’s top internet regulator said Thursday it had summoned Nvidia representatives to discuss recently discovered “serious security issues” involving the H20.The Cyberspace Administration of China said it had asked Nvidia to “explain the security risks of vulnerabilities and backdoors in its H20 chips sold to China and submit relevant supporting materials”.China is aiming to reduce reliance on foreign tech by promoting Huawei’s domestically developed 910C chip as an alternative to the H20, said Jost Wubbeke of the Sinolytics consultancy.”From that perspective, the US decision to allow renewed exports of the H20 to China could be seen as counterproductive, as it might tempt Chinese hyperscalers to revert to the H20, potentially undermining momentum behind the 910C and other domestic alternatives,” he said.Other hurdles to Nvidia’s operations in China are the sputtering economy, beset by a years-long property sector crisis, and heightened trade headwinds under US President Donald Trump.CEO Jensen Huang said during a visit to Beijing this month that the company remained committed to serving local customers, adding that he had been assured during talks with top Chinese officials that the country was “open and stable”.

Tech giants Amazon, Apple, Meta and Microsoft this week eclipsed earnings expectations, cashing in on artificial intelligence (AI) while navigating economic waters roiled by US tariffs.”Massive results seen by Microsoft and Meta further validate the use cases and unprecedented spending trajectory for the AI Revolution on both the enterprise and consumer fronts,” Wedbush tech analyst Dan Ives said in a note to investors.”We have barely scratched the surface of this 4th Industrial Revolution now playing out around the world led by the Big Tech stalwarts such as Nvidia, Microsoft, Palantir, Meta, Alphabet, and Amazon,” Ives added.Amazon reported a 35 percent jump in quarterly profits as the e-commerce giant said major investments in AI technology are paying off.”Our conviction that AI will change every customer experience is starting to play out,” said Chief Executive Andy Jassy, pointing to the company’s expanded Alexa+ service and new AI shopping agents.But the Seattle-based company’s profit outlook for the current quarter came in lower than hoped for, with investors worried that the cost of AI was weighing on the bottom line.This was despite a stellar second quarter that exceeded analyst expectations, much like it did for its AI-focused rivals Google, Microsoft and Meta, which posted bumper results for the period.Amazon’s net sales climbed 13 percent, signaling that the company was so far surviving impacts of the high-tariff trade policy under US President Donald Trump.Amazon Web Services (AWS), the company’s world-leading cloud computing division, led the charge with sales jumping 17.5 percent to $30.9 billion. Its strong performance reflects surging demand for cloud infrastructure to power AI applications, a trend that has benefited major cloud providers as companies race to adopt generative AI technologies.- $4 trillion club -Shares of Microsoft spiked Thursday following blowout quarterly results, lifting the tech giant into the previously unprecedented $4 trillion club along with Nvidia, another AI standout.The landmark valuation is the latest sign of growing bullishness about an AI investment boom that market watchers believe is still in the early stages — even as companies like Microsoft plan $100 billion or more in annual capital spending to add new capacity.”Cloud and AI is the driving force of business transformation across every industry and sector,” said Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella. At the heart of the results was a stunning surge in Azure, the company’s cloud computing platform, which is getting “supercharged” with AI, said Angelo Zino, technology analyst at CFRA Research.Zino attributed “just about all of” Microsoft’s recent climb in valuation to AI.- Superintelligence? -Meta reported robust second-quarter financial results Wednesday, with revenue jumping 22 percent year-over-year as the social media giant continues investing heavily in artificial intelligence.”We’ve had a strong quarter both in terms of our business and community,” said CEO Mark Zuckerberg. “I’m excited to build personal superintelligence for everyone in the world.”Zuckerberg has embarked on a major AI spending spree, poaching top researchers with expensive pay packages from rivals like OpenAI and Apple as he builds a team to pursue what he calls AI superintelligence.Hours before the earnings report, Zuckerberg insisted that the attainment of superintelligence — technology that would theoretically be more powerful than the human brain — is now “in sight.”Meanwhile Apple, which is seen as lagging in the AI race, beat expectations with earnings driven by strong iPhone sales despite US tariffs costing the company $800 million in the recently-ended quarter.Apple expects Trump’s tariffs to cost the iPhone maker $1.1 billion in the current quarter.”The results show that Apple’s iPhone strategy is working to offset the impact of looming challenges with AI development timelines, tariff pressures, and Google’s antitrust issues,” said Emarketer tech analyst Jacob Bourne.Apple chief executive Tim Cook said on an earnings call that taking the most advanced technologies and making them easy to use is “at the heart of our AI strategy.”Cook said Apple has been rolling out Apple Intelligence AI features and is “making good progress on a more personalized Siri.”

One of the best-known leaders in the decades-long struggle for US farm laborer rights, Dolores Huerta may be 95 years old but she is busier than ever.With the administration of US President Donald Trump ramping up immigration raids targeting farmworkers, the veteran activist — who co-founded the country’s largest agricultural union more than 60 years ago — is a galvanizing figure for those seeking to fight back.”People are reaching out because they want to do something,” she told AFP during an interview at the headquarters of her Dolores Huerta Foundation in Bakersfield, an agricultural nexus in California’s Central Valley.Born in New Mexico and raised in California, Huerta took the reins of the US farmworker movement in the 1960s along with the late activist Cesar Chavez.They created what is now United Farm Workers, launching an unprecedented fight for the rights of marginalized laborers who toil in the fields that feed America every day.At the time, Huerta was raising seven children — she later had four more — while going through a divorce.Finding the time to organize and mobilize workers remains as crucial as ever today, she said.”We’ve got to be a lot more active, because what’s happening right now is so huge. I liken it to what was happening in Germany before Hitler took power,” Huerta said. She argues that it is essential to prepare the electorate to vote in the 2026 midterms, which could reshape the US Congress. Both its chambers currently have Republican majorities.”This is the only way that this can be solved,” she said.- ‘Si se puede’ slogan -Much has changed since her time as a young union leader, but one thing that has never gone away is racism, Huerta said.”I believe that that illness of racism is what has really contaminated our political system,” said Huerta.”Trump is actually playing out that racism when he is again putting immigrants, and mostly people of color, into the detention centers” with “inhumane conditions,” she said.Many have been sent to countries with which they have no connection, Huerta noted, such as the 252 Venezuelans who were sent to a notorious El Salvador prison, before eventually being repatriated to their homeland as part of a political deal.For Huerta, the Republican-led crackdown is “absolutely atrocious… our people have been caught off guard.”Huerta believes that the swell of Latino support for Trump that aided his victory in November was driven by religious interests.Church leaders and lobbyists who are influential with Hispanic communities used issues like abortion and LGBTQ+ rights to “intimidate” Hispanic communities, who traditionally favor Democrats, into voting Republican, she said.But Huerta — whose famous “Si se puede” slogan was mirrored by Barack Obama’s “Yes, we can” rallying cry in 2008 — believes Trump’s promise to carry out the largest deportation operation in US history could yet backfire.In various sectors ranging from agriculture to hospitality and services, employers are realizing how much they need hard-working immigrants, she said.- ‘Fear’ -The risks have sharply risen for many in her community since Trump came to power, but for Huerta personally, activism has long had perilous consequences.When she was 58, Huerta was arrested and brutally beaten by police at a San Francisco protest.Her commitment to the union movement also meant she was an absent mother — and even today, she spends more time on her work than with her many children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren.Huerta has often been the only woman in male-dominated spaces, and is renowned by many for her ability to face down corporate power.In February, her foundation helped drive an ongoing boycott against the retail giant Target over its decision to end pro-diversity programs following Trump’s election.”Trump instilled fear in all these corporations,” she said.Using tactics like boycotts to influence billionaire business owners who can “pull Trump’s strings,” she said, “we finally are able to move them in the right direction.””They need to start speaking up and stop these dangerous policies of Trump.”

President Donald Trump, who is remodeling the White House to his tastes, will build a massive ballroom for hosting official receptions, one of the largest projects at the US executive mansion in over a century.Trump himself and unspecified donors will foot the bill for the $200 million project, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told a press briefing on Thursday.”For 150 years, presidents, administrations and White House staff have longed for a large event space on the White House complex,” the spokeswoman said.”There’s never been a president that was good at ballrooms,” the 79-year-old president and former real estate developer told reporters of the latest bid to leave his mark on the White House.”I’m good at building things, and we’ll get it built quickly and on time. It’ll be beautiful,” said Trump, assuring that the character of the original building would be preserved.The new structure will span over 8,000 square meters (90,000 square feet) and have space to seat 650 people, according to Leavitt.Work on the ballroom — one of Trump’s long-time ambitions — will begin in September and is expected to be completed “well before” the end of his second term in January 2029, Leavitt said.The hope is it will host grand state dinners, given in honor of foreign heads of state visiting Washington. Until now, these were generally done by erecting a huge tent on the White House grounds.- Facade -A model of the ballroom presented by the government shows it will be a white building with tall windows. Its columns and front look reminiscent of the main White House building, a facade is known worldwide.The ballroom building will replace the East Wing, which usually houses the offices of the US first lady.Trump, who does not shy away from the gaudy, has also redone the Oval Office to splash the room in gold — from the stars surrounding the presidential seal on the ceiling, to the gold statues on the fireplace, to the mantel itself. The project is shaping up to be one of the most significant to break ground at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue since renovation and expansion works undertaken by President Theodore Roosevelt at the start of the 20th century.President Harry Truman also oversaw notable construction work between 1948 and 1952, but did so without changing the external structure.Trump has said for some time that he wants to build a White House ballroom inspired by his own properties.On Thursday, he praised the newly built, lavish ballroom — named after himself — at his Turnberry golf resort in Scotland, one of dozens of properties owned by the Trump family.It will also be inspired by the ballroom of the Mar-a-Lago mansion in Florida, which has served as the model for Trump’s remodeling of the White House to suit himself.The Republican billionaire, inspired by the patios of Mar-a-Lago, recently ripped up the lawn at the White House’s historic Rose Garden and is paving that area, where official events are often held.He is flying two huge American flags outside the White House, which has been the residence and workplace of American presidents since 1800. 

Steven Knight, the creator of gritty TV crime series “Peaky Blinders,” will write the highly anticipated next James Bond movie, studio Amazon MGM announced Thursday.Knight will work alongside previously announced director Denis Villeneuve (“Dune”) to bring the world’s most famous fictional spy back to the big screen after a prolonged absence. Amazon MGM Studios acquired creative control of the 007 movies in February, and has moved quickly to get one of Hollywood’s most valuable franchises back into production.There has been no new Bond film since 2021’s “No Time To Die.” Knight is best known as the mind behind violent British gangster series “Peaky Blinders,” which was set in industrial England at the turn of the 20th century and became a global hit.Running for six seasons, and with a Netflix film version currently in the works, “Peaky Blinders” turbo-charged the careers of leading man Cillian Murphy, alongside a stellar supporting cast including Tom Hardy, Anya Taylor-Joy and Kingsley Ben-Adir.In addition to “Peaky Blinders,” Knight also co-created the wildly popular television quiz show “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire” and has penned four novels.The Birmingham, England-based screenwriter, producer and director’s other TV credits include “Taboo,” “See,” “This Town,” and “All the Light We Cannot See.”The Bond films, based on Ian Fleming’s novels, have earned more than $7 billion collectively at the global box office since debuting in 1962.No release date or title has yet been set for the film franchise’s 26th installment.And despite frenzied speculation among fans, there has been no announcement on which actor will replace Daniel Craig as the suave British super-spy.Among the actors most discussed to be the next Bond are Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Tom Holland, Harris Dickinson, Jacob Elordi, and Ben-Adir — but Amazon MGM has so far refused to disclose the franchise’s most closely guarded secret.

Former US vice president Kamala Harris on Thursday announced she will provide an inside look at her unsuccessful 2024 presidential run against Donald Trump in a book titled “107 Days.”The memoir, published by Simon & Schuster, will be released on September 23 in the United States.”Just over a year ago, I launched my campaign for president of the United States, 107 days — traveling the country, fighting for our future — the shortest presidential campaign in modern history,” Harris said in a video posted on social media.The first woman to serve as vice president of the United States, Harris became the Democratic Party’s presidential nominee after Joe Biden withdrew from the race in July amid concerns about his cognitive health.Harris said she wrote the book with “candor and reflection” and promised a “behind-the-scenes account” of the campaign.The former US senator representing California had announced Wednesday that she would not run for governor of the state in 2026, but according to US media, a 2028 White House run is not out of the question.In her video, Harris says that one truth kept coming back to her: “Sometimes, the fight takes a while” — a statement that is likely to fuel rumors about her political future.- Colbert show -After having virtually disappeared from public following her defeat by Trump, Harris is now mounting a return. The Democrat will make an appearance Thursday’s “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert,” a flagship late-night talk show on US television that CBS recently canceled.CBS cited financial reasons for its decision to axe the show hosted by the well-known critic of the president. The network has been roiled in controversy since its parent company Paramount settled a Trump lawsuit over an election-time segment with Harris on CBS News’s “60 Minutes” show. The $16 million settlement — slammed by Colbert and others — came soon before the entertainment giant closed an $8 billion merger with Skydance Media.Asked on Thursday about Harris’s political future, Trump said he “wouldn’t call her a skilled politician.””She can’t talk. She can’t do an interview. I thought it was a very strange campaign we had,” Trump told reporters.”Yeah, I think I’m going to buy it. I’d love to see it,” Trump also joked about “107 Days.”Another former Biden administration figure — former White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre — announced the upcoming release of her book titled “Independent” last month. She has left the Democratic Party, which she accuses of betraying her former boss.

Brazil vowed Thursday to combat US President Donald Trump’s tariffs on its exports, saying it intends to lodge appeals if last-ditch negotiations fail.Finance Minister Fernando Haddad said the tariffs announced Wednesday were “more favorable” than expected, with several key export products exempted.Still, there “is a lot of injustice in the measures announced yesterday. Corrections need to be made,” he told reporters.Citing a “witch hunt” against his far-right ally Jair Bolsonaro — Brazil’s former president on trial for allegedly plotting a coup — Trump on Wednesday signed an executive order adding a 40 percent tariff on Brazilian products, bringing total trade duties to 50 percent.The levies affect coffee and meat, two products of which Brazil is the world’s top exporter.The order, which takes effect on August 6, listed exemptions for nearly 700 other products including key exports such as planes, orange juice and pulp, Brazil nuts, and some iron, steel and aluminum products. Leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva — the man Bolsonaro is accused of having sought to topple — has denounced the tariffs as an attack on the “sovereignty” of South America’s largest economy.”The negotiation is not over; it starts today,” Vice President Geraldo Alckmin, tapped to oversee talks with Washington, told TV Globo.Alckmin said the new tariff will apply to nearly 36 percent of Brazil’s exports to the United States, equal to some $14.5 billion last year.Haddad said he would speak with his American counterpart, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, and “there will be a cycle of negotiations.”He did not give a date.”We are starting from a point that is more favorable than one could have imagined, but still far from the finish line,” the minister said.If negotiations fail, Haddad said Brasilia would “file appeals with the appropriate authorities, both in the United States and with international bodies.”- ‘Judge and jury’ -Trump’s Brazil tariff is among the highest imposed on US trading partners.Unlike with other countries, the measures against Brazil have been framed in openly political terms, sweeping aside centuries-old trade ties and a surplus that Brasilia put at $284 million last year. “These are harsh measures that will have a real impact on important sectors of the Brazilian economy,” Reginaldo Nogueira, an economist with Brazil’s IBMEC business school, told AFP.”The exemptions help mitigate some of the pressure on Brazil but primarily protect strategic goods for the American economy,” he added.Haddad said the Brazilian government would put in place protection measures for the most affected companies, and noted that “nothing that was decided yesterday cannot be reviewed.”Trump’s order was based on the Brazilian government’s “politically motivated persecution, intimidation, harassment, censorship, and prosecution of (Bolsonaro) and thousands of his supporters,” according to the White House.It also cited Brazil’s “unusual and extraordinary policies and actions harming US companies, the free speech rights of US persons, US foreign policy, and the US economy,” singling out Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes.Moraes is the judge presiding over Bolsonaro’s coup trial and has clashed repeatedly with the far-right in Brazil, as well as with tech titan Elon Musk, over the spread of online misinformation.The US Treasury announced financial sanctions on Moraes Wednesday, saying he had “taken it upon himself to be judge and jury in an unlawful witch hunt against US and Brazilian citizens and companies.”A Supreme Court source told AFP that Moraes “does not have assets in the United States” where the sanctions would have frozen them.

Apple on Thursday reported quarterly profit of $23.4 billion, topping forecasts despite concerns about the effect of US tariffs on its supply chain.Revenue was $94 billion for the usually slow quarter ending in June, the iPhone maker said.”Apple is proud to report a June quarter revenue record with double-digit growth in iPhone, Mac and Services and growth around the world, in every geographic segment,” said Apple chief executive Tim Cook.Apple shares were up more than two percent in after-market trading.Revenue from iPhone sales during the quarter was $44.6 billion, compared with $39.3 billion in the same period a year earlier, according to Apple.Global shipments of smartphones fell marginally to 288.9 million units in the recently-ended quarter, according to market-tracker Canalys.Samsung was the largest vendor, shipping 57.5 million smartphones, while Apple finished second with iPhone shipments down two percent at 44.8 million units, Canalys reported.”Apple’s performance showed strong resilience amid fierce competition in China and an inventory correction in the US as it adjusted to the rapidly changing tariffs,” the market tracker said in its findings.Cook said that the Trump tariffs cost Apple $800 million in the quarter that just ended and are expected to cost the iPhone maker $1.1 billion in the current quarter.”Assuming the current global tariff rates, policies, and applications do not change for the balance of the quarter, and no new tariffs are added, we estimate the impact to add about $1.1 billion to our costs,” Cook said.Tariffs are essentially a tax paid by those importing goods to the United States. This means Apple is on the hook for tariffs on iPhones and other products or components it brings into the country from abroad.- More in US -Cook said that most iPhones sold in the United States now come from India as Apple works to navigate US President Donald Trump’s trade war with China.Trump has taken aim at India with a 25 percent duty to begin Friday — slightly lower than previously threatened — after talks between Washington and New Delhi failed to bring about a trade pact.Apple’s tariff cost is up because sales are up, according to Cook.”In terms of what we do to mitigate, we obviously try to optimize our our supply chain,” Cook said of managing the tariff hit.”Ultimately, we will do more in the United States; we’ve committed $500 billion investment in the US over the next four years.”Tit-for-tat exchanges have seen hefty US levies imposed on China, with Beijing setting retaliatory barriers on US imports.Sales of iPhones in mainland China were $15.4 billion in the quarter, compared with $14.7 billion in the same period a year ago, according to Apple.Revenue in Apple’s services business selling digital content and subscriptions to fans of its devices grew to $27.4 billion in the quarter, Apple reported.”The results show that Apple’s iPhone strategy is working to offset the impact of looming challenges with AI development timelines, tariff pressures, and Google’s antitrust issues,” said Emarketer analyst Jacob Bourne.”The company’s successful pivot to iPhone manufacturing in India, demonstrates supply chain flexibility, while its return to iPhone growth in China and continued services segment expansion, including deeper financial services offerings, show diversification beyond hardware.”

President Donald Trump’s dream of a new world trade order faced a crucial test Thursday, with dozens of economies –- including key commercial partners like Canada — yet to secure US tariff deals ahead of a midnight deadline.The last-gasp scramble to strike bilateral accords came as an appeals court in Washington considered the legality behind Trump’s strategy of invoking emergency economic powers to declare sweeping duties on imports.The 79-year-old Republican doubled down on his wide-ranging levies, posting on Truth Social: “Tariffs are making America GREAT & RICH Again.”He insisted in a separate post that the world’s biggest economy would have “no chance of survival or success” without protectionist measures.But question marks linger over the effectiveness of Trump’s plans — and whether he will really follow through on his most dramatic threats.Hours before his declared deadline, Trump announced that he was delaying a tariff hike on Mexican products, originally due Friday, for 90 days after talks with counterpart Claudia Sheinbaum.White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said Trump will sign an executive order Thursday to implement his various threatened tariffs.Other road bumps remain.While Trump has touted a surge in customs revenues this year, economists warn the duties could fuel inflation.And the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit was hearing arguments Thursday in cases brought against Trump’s blanket tariffs targeting various economies.A government lawyer told the court that Trump’s tariff orders were covered by “broad discretion” he enjoys when handling national emergencies — including pressing economic issues.A lower court’s ruling had blocked most of the duties from taking effect, prompting the Trump administration’s challenge. The duties have been allowed to remain for now.- Deal or no deal -So far, Washington has announced pacts with Britain, Vietnam, Japan, Indonesia, the Philippines, South Korea and the European Union. New rates negotiated were expected to take effect Friday.South Korea squeezed in an agreement on a 15 percent tariff, down from 25 percent that Trump initially threatened.But Trump announced 50 percent tariffs on Brazilian products — although delaying their imposition and allowing key exemptions — as an effort to pressure the country to drop its prosecution of right-wing former president Jair Bolsonaro on coup charges.He also unveiled a 25 percent levy on Indian imports, and warned Canada of trade repercussions for planning to recognize a Palestinian state.And the details of agreements that have been made remain vague.The EU, while having reached a pact, continues seeking a carve-out for its wine industry.Looming over the global economy is also the unresolved trade tussle between the United States and rival China, with the superpowers in talks to maintain a truce after initially imposing triple-digit tariffs on each other.- Canada threat -Washington has yet to strike a deal with neighboring Canada, while Trump said he would maintain 25 percent duties on Mexican imports for now.”We haven’t spoken to Canada today,” Trump said Thursday, adding that Washington has “made a few deals today,” without providing specifics.US-Canada ties came under renewed threat after Prime Minister Mark Carney announced plans to recognize a Palestinian state at the UN General Assembly in September.”That will make it very hard for us to make a Trade Deal with them,” Trump warned on social media.Carney said Wednesday that both countries “may not conclude talks by August 1st.”Goods covered by a North American trade pact have been excluded from Trump’s recent tariffs.Although Mexico and Canada were not originally targeted under Trump’s “reciprocal tariff” plan, he had separately threatened them with the same Friday deadline.The tariff hikes due Friday were announced in April when Trump slapped a 10 percent levy on goods from almost all partners — citing unfair trade practices.This rate was set to rise to varying levels for dozens of economies, but Washington twice postponed their implementation.