The European Parliament gave the green light this Tuesday to two key legislative acts to implement the trade pact with the United States, an agreement initially forged on July 27, 2025 in Turnberry (Scotland, United Kingdom) by the American president, Donald Trump, and the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen. That handshake on the magnate’s golf course was just the beginning of a tremendously painful process, in which it was necessary to propose and refine until reaching a definitive text. This is it and it already has the approval it needed.
The final approval by the European Parliament has occurred in a context of renewed tension, a day after Trump threatened to impose tariffs on French wine and champagne if Paris does not withdraw its digital tax on large North American technology companies. “Things don’t work that way,” French President Emmanuel Macron reminded him.
Despite these latest warnings of trade conflict, European legislators decided to support the pact. The main regulation, in charge of modifying tariff and trade conditions, has been approved with 440 votes in favor, 151 against and 50 abstentions. A second regulation, focused on extending and expanding the tariff-free import regime for American lobster (now including processed lobster), has passed with 444 votes in favor, 152 against and 54 abstentions.
Through the new legislation, the Union will eliminate customs duties on the vast majority of US industrial products and introduce preferential access to its market for a wide variety of US agricultural and fishery products. For their part, European countries agree to pay a US tariff of up to 15% on the goods they export to the North American country.
In addition, under the terms of the so-called Turnberry Agreement, the EU commits to investing $600 billion in strategic US sectors by 2028, as well as purchasing US energy worth $750 billion.
As EFE recalls, this year, the European Parliament had stopped the ratification of the agreement on two occasions: at the end of January, during the crisis between the EU and the US over control of Greenland (an autonomous territory that is part of the Kingdom of Denmark), and at the end of February, after the US Supreme Court annulled Trump’s tariff policy.
Termination, suspension and safeguard clauses
The European Parliament and the Council made important improvements to the initial proposals presented by the Commission in August 2025, creating a legal “safety net” amid fears that Washington will breach the pact. The most notable defensive points of the approved regulations are, as explained by the European Parliament in a note:
- Termination clause: The regulation on industrial and agri-environmental imports will cease to apply on 31 December 2029. The Commission will be required to submit an assessment of its trade effects by 30 June 2029 before proposing any extension.
- Derivatives of steel and aluminum: Given the uncertainty generated in August 2025 when the US added 407 product categories to the list of steel and aluminum derivatives subject to tariffs, Parliament imposed strict conditions. The European Commission may immediately suspend tariff preferences if, by December 31, 2026, the United States has not lowered or maintains rates higher than 15% on European steel and aluminum derivatives (compared to the 50% it currently applies).
- Strengthened suspension clause: The community bloc reserves the right to paralyze trade advantages if the US does not satisfactorily address European complaints about Union exports that had a global tariff limit of 15% until February 24, 2026.
- Safeguard mechanism: The Commission is authorized to investigate and swiftly withdraw trade preferences granted to the US if a massive increase in imports threatens to cause “serious damage” to the EU industry or agricultural sector. To this end, detailed quarterly monitoring of trade flows will be carried out.
Commission President Ursula von der Leyen shakes hands with US President Donald Trump at Trump Turnberry Golf Club, Scotland, on July 27, 2025.
A heated debate
Several MEPs had been criticizing the text for considering it unbalanced and giving in too much to pressure from Washington. And that criticism has already been made clear this morning at the parliamentary headquarters in Strasbourg (France). Thus, Belgian MEP Kathleen Van Brempt, representing the group of Socialists and Democrats (S&D), specified before the vote that the pact continues to fall below the expectations created and suggested that the Commission rushed its processing, not only because of the US threat to freeze the agreement, but also for reasons of global security, specifically to safeguard US support for Ukraine. In the supposed peace negotiations proposed by Trump since February of last year, the vision of Russia, the invader, has always predominated.
However, the EC insists on its defense. “Transatlantic trade is incomparable and deserves to be preserved: it means that our companies and jobs benefit, while opening the door to deeper cooperation on many issues of strategic importance,” Trade Commissioner Maros Sefcovic emphasized on social media.
For his part, Bernd Lange (also from the S&D, but from Germany), who is the president of the International Trade Committee of the European Parliament and rapporteur of the text, defended Parliament’s firmness in the face of pressure: “Our determination has borne fruit, offering a more solid agreement (…) and much stronger guarantees than originally planned.” Lange emphasized that this regulation becomes a defense tool: “It not only strengthens and stabilizes trade relations between the EU and the United States, but also gives the EU the ability to respond if the US does not keep its side of the deal.”
After the approval of the European Parliament, the Council of the European Union must formally adopt the final texts. The new regulations will officially come into force the day after their publication in the Official Journal of the European Union.
