![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/news-p.v1.20260221.539485f4c74d474986da594bce463731_P1.jpg\")
A US flag files at the Port of Long Beach Friday in Long Beach, California. (AP) <\/p>\n A US flag files at the Port of Long Beach Friday in Long Beach, California. (AP) <\/p>\n
The following is a chronology of major events related to the tariff agreement between South Korea and the United States over US President Donald Trump’s sweeping tariff policy, which could face a setback following a ruling by the US Supreme Court against Washington’s scheme.<\/p>\n
Jan. 20, 2025 — Trump takes office as the US’ 57th president.<\/p>\n
Feb. 10, 2025 — Trump announces plans to levy a 25 percent tariff on all steel and aluminum imports.<\/p>\n
Feb. 13, 2025 — Trump signs a presidential memorandum to devise a comprehensive plan to customize “reciprocal” tariffs based on trading partners’ duties, non-tariff barriers, exchange rate policies and other elements. US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said Washington’s study on the new tariffs will be complete by April 1.<\/p>\n
March 12, 2025 — The US begins imposing 25 percent tariffs on steel and aluminum imports.<\/p>\n
March 26, 2025 — Trump announces an imposition of 25 percent tariffs on all foreign-made cars and car parts starting April 3.<\/p>\n
March 30, 2025 — Trump declares plans to impose a 10 percent baseline tariff on all imports and country-specific “reciprocal tariffs” starting April 2.<\/p>\n
April 2, 2025 — Trump unveils “reciprocal” tariff rates for major trading partners, including 25 percent duties for South Korea.<\/p>\n
April 9, 2025 — Trump announces a 90-day suspension of reciprocal tariffs for all countries except for China. Tariffs on Chinese goods are raised to 145 percent.<\/p>\n
April 24, 2025 — Then Deputy Prime Minister Choi Sang-mok and then Industry Minister Ahn Duk-geun hold “2+2” trade talks with US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer in Washington.<\/p>\n
June 3, 2025 — Lee Jae Myung is elected president of South Korea following the ouster of President Yoon Suk Yeol after his declaration of martial law.<\/p>\n
June 24, 2025 — Trade Minister Yeo Han-koo visits the US and requests for South Korea to be exempted from Washington’s tariff scheme in meetings with Greer and Lutnick.<\/p>\n
July 8, 2025 — Yeo travels to the US and meets US government officials, including Lutnik and Greer, to discuss tariff issues and industrial cooperation.<\/p>\n
July 8, 2025 — Trump sends a letter to Lee, stating that the US will impose a 25 percent tariff on South Korea starting Aug. 1.<\/p>\n
July 23, 2025 — Yeo travels to Washington and meets with Greer.<\/p>\n
July 24, 2025 — Industry Minister Kim Jung-kwan visits the US to join Yeo for trade negotiations with Lutnick.<\/p>\n
July 25, 2025 — Kim and Yeo fly to New York to continue negotiations with Lutnick.<\/p>\n
July 27, 2025 — Kim and Yeo travel to Scotland for further tariff negotiations with Lutnick.<\/p>\n
July 29, 2025 — Seoul’s trade delegation, including Finance Minister Koo Yun-cheol, meets with Lutnick and Greer for further trade negotiations.<\/p>\n
July 30, 2025 — Seoul’s trade delegation meets Trump at the White House. Following the meeting, Trump announces that his administration has reached a trade deal with South Korea to lower “reciprocal” tariffs on Seoul to 15 percent in return for its commitment to invest $350 billion in the US and other pledges.<\/p>\n
Aug. 26, 2025 — Lee and Trump hold a summit in Washington, where they effectively endorsed the outcome of the tariff deal. Seoul’s presidential office said that the two nations are working to draw up a non-binding memorandum of understanding (MOU) after ironing out details.<\/p>\n
Sept. 12, 2025 — Kim visits the US for follow-up talks with Lutnick to iron out differences over the details of the trade agreement under which South Korea pledged to invest $350 billion in the US in exchange for Washington lowering its “reciprocal” tariffs on South Korea from 25 percent to 15 percent.<\/p>\n
Sept. 16, 2025 — Yeo visits the US for follow-up talks with Greer on tariff issues. Meanwhile, the US reduces tariffs on Japanese autos to 15 percent from 27.5 percent.<\/p>\n
Sept. 22, 2025 — Lee stresses the need for South Korea to secure financial mechanisms, such as a currency swap arrangement with the US, to meet Washington’s investment demands, warning that the country could face a crisis similar to that of 1997 without such measures.<\/p>\n
Sept. 25, 2025 — Trump describes South Korea’s $350 billion investment commitment as “up front,” noting that his administration is taking in “tremendous” amounts of money thanks to his tariff policy.<\/p>\n
Oct. 4, 2025 — Kim and Lutnick meet in New York to discuss tariff issues. Upon returning home, Kim told reporters that the two countries have reached a broad understanding over the sensitivity of Seoul’s foreign exchange market.<\/p>\n
Oct. 16, 2025 — Kim and Lutnick hold another round of talks in Washington. Yeo, Koo and Kim Yong-beom, presidential chief of staff for policy, were also in the US for meetings with US officials to finalize the details of the agreement.<\/p>\n
Oct. 25, 2025 — Trump says in a press meeting aboard Air Force One that a trade deal with South Korea is “pretty close to being finalized” and he is “ready” if Seoul is ready to finalize the details of the framework deal.<\/p>\n
Oct. 26, 2025 — Lee says in an interview with Bloomberg that South Korea and the US remain deadlocked on key details about Seoul’s $350 billion investment pledge as part of the trade agreement, though he believes they will be able to reach a “rational result.”<\/p>\n
Oct. 29, 2025 — South Korea and the US announce a trade deal at a summit between Lee and Trump on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation gathering in Gyeongju. The agreement calls for Seoul to make a $200 billion cash investment in the US with an annual cap of $20 billion, as part of a broader $350 billion investment package. The remaining $150 billion will be spent on shipbuilding cooperation projects.<\/p>\n
Nov. 14, 2025 — South Korea and the US release a joint fact sheet outlining the details of the summit agreements, which encompass their commitments in tariffs and other issues.<\/p>\n
Dec. 4, 2025 — The US publishes a Federal Register notice implementing portions of its trade agreement with South Korea, including a 15 percent tariff on Korean automobiles applied retroactively to Nov. 1.<\/p>\n
Jan. 27, 2026 — Trump says he is raising “reciprocal” tariffs and auto duties on South Korea to 25 percent from 15 percent as he argued the Asian ally’s legislature has not yet completed a domestic process to implement the bilateral trade deal.<\/p>\n
In response, Cheong Wa Dae said South Korea will convey its commitment to the US to implementing its trade deal with Washington.<\/p>\n
Jan. 28, 2026 — Trump says his administration will work “something” out with South Korea regarding the tariff agreement without specifying details.<\/p>\n
Feb. 21, 2026 — The US Supreme Court upholds a lower court’s ruling against Trump’s use of the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act to justify his “reciprocal” tariffs on South Korea and other trading partners in a major setback to his trade policy.<\/p>\n
In response, Trump signed a proclamation to impose a new 10 percent global tariff and vowed to take other measures to replace the sweeping emergency duties that the Supreme Court struck down.<\/p>\n
(Yonhap)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A US flag files at the Port of Long Beach Friday in Long Beach, California. (AP) The following…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":186987,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[87992,19726,87989,87988,70411,131,133,132,87990,87991,87987,87994,87995,87993],"class_list":{"0":"post-186986","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-long-beach","8":"tag-asia-news","9":"tag-k-pop","10":"tag-koreaherald","11":"tag-korean-news","12":"tag-kpop","13":"tag-long-beach","14":"tag-long-beach-headlines","15":"tag-long-beach-news","16":"tag-south-korea-news","17":"tag-south-korea-news-in-english","18":"tag-the-korea-herald","19":"tag-87994","20":"tag-87995","21":"tag-87993"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/186986","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=186986"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/186986\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/186987"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=186986"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=186986"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=186986"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}