U.S. trade strategy adapts amid legal battles and geopolitical tensions

The United States accelerates its trade and security initiatives, balancing legal challenges to tariffs with strategic moves on alliances, technology, and resource diplomacy amid rising regional tensions with China and evolving international sanctions.

Welcome to this month’s BR International Trade Report update, combining Blank Rome’s briefing with government documents and reporting to set recent trade and geopolitical developments in context.

As the U.S. Su...

preme Court weighs the legality of the Trump Administration’s “reciprocal” and “fentanyl” tariffs imposed under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), administration officials have publicly signalled contingency plans. According to Blank Rome’s BR International Trade Report, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told an event in New York that the Administration “can recreate the exact tariff structure with [Sections] 301, with 232, with 122.” National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett was quoted in the same briefing as saying the Administration has “a backup plan that will get these things in place right away…[s]o we’re going to win either way.” Reuters reporting earlier in the year also recorded Bessent’s confidence that the Supreme Court would uphold the measures and noted discussion of alternate statutory authorities, including provisions from older tariff laws. An adverse court ruling, observers warn, could trigger refund claims and litigation by importers who have already paid the tariffs.

The White House on December 4 released the 2025 National Security Strategy (NSS), which explicitly links trade policy and regional security to a broader foreign-policy framework. The NSS asserts a so-called “Trump Corollary” to the Monroe Doctrine, seeking to limit the ability of non‑Hemisphere actors to gain strategic footholds in the Western Hemisphere and to deepen partnership approaches to drug enforcement. According to the document, this posture is intended to restore U.S. preeminence in the region. Reuters analysis of the strategy noted its wider critique of Europe and a call for greater NATO burden‑sharing, underscoring how trade, defence and diplomatic priorities are being folded into a single strategic posture.

Security and enforcement dynamics at sea have intensified. On December 10 U.S. forces boarded and seized a sanctioned tanker near the Venezuelan coast that was alleged to have been falsely flying a Guyanese flag. The Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control subsequently imposed sanctions on relatives of Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro and on vessels linked to sanctioned oil shipments. Venezuelan and Cuban officials condemned the action, with Venezuela’s foreign minister Yván Gil Pinto calling it an “act of international piracy,” and on December 16 President Trump announced a “total and complete blockade of all sanctioned oil tankers” entering and exiting Venezuelan ports. The seizures and sanctions illustrate how trade measures and maritime actions are being deployed together to pursue sanctions objectives.

Washington has also sought to institutionalise allied cooperation on critical technologies and supply chains. The State Department announced a new multilateral initiative, dubbed “Pax Silica,” joining the United States with Australia, Israel, Japan, Singapore, South Korea and the United Kingdom to coordinate critical‑minerals policy, export controls and investment screening and to address choke points in global supply chains; the initial summit was attended by the Netherlands and the United Arab Emirates. Concurrently, the Administration has launched the Genesis Mission, a domestic effort to marshal federal scientific databases to accelerate AI research for scientific discovery, national security and energy aims, an effort presented as complementary to existing executive actions and America’s AI policy agenda.

Trade diplomacy continued apace as the year closed. The Administration announced bilateral and regional understandings with Argentina, Ecuador, El Salvador and Guatemala that preserve those countries’ reciprocal tariff rates while committing to address non‑tariff barriers and other measures. A framework with Switzerland and Liechtenstein would lower U.S. reciprocal tariff rates on their products to 15 percent in exchange for tariff removals and a pledged $200 billion of private investment in the United States, according to the BR report. The Administration also announced an “Economic and Defense Partnership” with Saudi Arabia including a Strategic Defence Agreement and a near‑term investment pledge said by the White House to approach $1 trillion. In healthcare trade, Washington and London struck a three‑year, zero‑tariff exemption on UK‑origin pharmaceuticals; U.S. Secretary of Health Robert F. Kennedy Jr. called the deal one that “strengthens the global environment for innovative medicines and brings long‑overdue balance to U.S.‑U.K. pharmaceutical trade,” according to the briefing.

Resource diplomacy on critical minerals moved forward with a December 5 Strategic Partnership Agreement between the United States and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, creating a Binational Economic Partnership Forum and authorising DRC designation of “Strategic Projects” that could give U.S. firms preferential access; the U.S. Development Finance Corporation subsequently announced two letters of interest in Congolese mining and rail projects. In related trade adjustments, the Administration issued executive orders in November narrowing the scope of reciprocal tariffs on many Brazilian agricultural products, lifting IEEPA duties from specified items.

Geopolitical tensions with China continue to shape regional risk. Chinese military aircraft reportedly locked radar onto Japanese fighters near Okinawa following statements by Japan’s Prime Minister about possible responses to an invasion of Taiwan; China’s defence ministry protested the Japanese “provocative actions,” reflecting continued danger of military friction in East Asia. Separately, the Dutch government paused a contested effort to assert control over Chinese‑owned chipmaker Nexperia after talks with Beijing, underlining how semiconductor supply security is colliding with political and investment review processes.

Across the trade portfolio, the Administration has signalled a readiness to use a mix of tariffs, investment screening, sanctions and negotiated frameworks to advance economic and security priorities. Blank Rome’s report and contemporaneous government documents and press reporting show a coherent strategy of aligning trade instruments with geopolitical objectives, but also suggest legal and diplomatic risks. If courts narrow the Administration’s use of IEEPA authority, officials have publicly signalled swift fallback measures; if litigation or diplomatic pushback follows enforcement actions such as tanker seizures or sweeping tariff programmes, businesses and foreign governments may face uncertainty and potential disruption in supply chains and investment plans. The coming legal rulings, implementation of the NSS priorities and the pace of allied coordination on technology and critical minerals will be key to watching how U.S. trade policy evolves in 2026.

Source: Noah Wire Services