Trump delays 50% EU tariffs until July 9 as Von der Leyen demands ‘serious negotiations’ - all you need to know

US President Donald Trump announced that the United States will postpone the planned 50% tariff on European Union goods from the original date of June 1 to July 9 in order to buy time for negotiations with the bloc. The announcement comes after a Sunday phone call with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, who, according to Trump, said that she “wants to get down to serious negotiations.”

“I told anybody that would listen, they have to do that,” Trump told reporters on Sunday in Morristown, New Jersey. According to Trump, Von der Leyen vowed to “rapidly get together and see if we can work something out.”

For her part, von der Leyen said the EU and the US “share the world's most consequential and close trade relationship.”

Von der Leyen said on Sunday in a post on X that “Europe is ready to advance talks swiftly and decisively,” but “a good deal” will need “time until July 9.” That’s the date that Trump’s 90-day pause of his so-called reciprocal tariffs had been set to end.

The EU had been slated for a 20% tariff under those reciprocal rates announced in April.

However, Trump on Friday, in a social media post had threatened to impose the 50% tariff on EU goods, complaining that the 27-member bloc had been “very difficult to deal with” on trade and that negotiations were “going nowhere.” Those tariffs would have kicked in starting June 1.

But the call with von der Leyen appeared to smooth over tensions, at least for now.

“I agreed to the extension — July 9, 2025 — It was my privilege to do so,” Trump said on Truth Social shortly after he spoke with reporters on Sunday evening.

The EU last week shared a revived trade proposal with the US in a bid to boost talks, and the bloc’s trade chief, Maros Sefcovic, held a call with his US counterpart, Jamieson Greer, on Friday.