A major European economy is expected to take the biggest blow from Donald Trump‘s “Liberation Day” tariffs that will be announced on Wednesday. The US president has not disclosed the full extent of the levies, but has threatened to slap them on “all countries”.

He did however confirm a 25% tax on all cars imported to the US, which could spell disaster for Europe’s largest produce of cars, Germany. Oliver Chapman, Group CEO of supply chain management company OCI, warned Europe’s largest economy could see its biggest industry “heavily impacted”. He told the Express: “The automotive industry will be heavily impacted by ‘Liberation Day’ as described by Trump’s tariffs announcement.

“Germany will likely be impacted the most with a 25% tariff on foreign-made vehicles. This is an effort to get more Americans to buy domestically produced vehicles.”

In 2024, Germany produced a whopping 4.1 million passenger cars, including almost 1.3 million electric vehicles. In terms of exports, roughly 3.4 million new cars were sent overseas, valued at £112 billion, with the US importing 13% of this.

Two of the most popular German car brands are BMW and Mercedes-Benz, and Mr Chapman cautioned that they could both be “seriously impacted” on April 2.

He explained: “The US is a major importer of BMW and Mercedes-Benz. It consistently ranks as one of the top two purchasers of these makes, regularly swapping places with China. Both of these car manufacturers could be seriously impacted on Wednesday.”

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Since taking office once again in January, the president has been determined to fight back against what he believes to be the US’s unfair trading conditions.

He said: “This is the beginning of Liberation Day in America. We’re going to charge countries for doing business in our country and taking our jobs, taking our wealth, taking a lot of things that they’ve been taking over the years.

“They’ve taken so much out of our country, friend and foe. And, frankly, friend has been oftentimes much worse than foe.”

The Republican told reporters on Air Force One: “You’d start with all countries. Essentially all of the countries that we’re talking about.”