President Trump claims the international trading system is unfair to the United States. The Trump administration is seeking to rectify trade imbalances through tariffs and is trying to reshape the global economy. Member of the European Parliament Daniel Caspary joins this episode of The Zeitgeist to discuss how Europe is responding to the U.S. administration’s trade measures and the importance of continued transatlantic engagement.



Host

Jeff Rathke, President, AGI

Guests

Daniel Caspary, Member of the European Parliament

Peter Rashish, Vice President and Director, Geoeconomics Program, AGI



Transcript

Jeff Rathke

Welcome, listeners, to this episode of The Zeitgeist. We are delighted to have with us Daniel Caspary. Daniel, thanks for being with us today.

Daniel Caspary

Thank you for the invitation.

Jeff Rathke

We are speaking on June 2. Daniel Caspary is the head of the German Christian Democratic delegation in the European Parliament. He’s also a member of the Trade Committee and has a lot of expertise in that field. We are delighted to have the opportunity to speak today during your visit to Washington.

Daniel Caspary

Thank you so much for having the opportunity for this exchange.

Jeff Rathke

Daniel is a member also of the Presidium of the Christian Democratic Union of Germany. He is from Baden-Wurttemberg around Mannheim. Is that your hometown?

Daniel Caspary

My hometown is close to Karlsruhe, but my constituency has the beautiful cities of Mannheim—you just mentioned—Heidelberg, Karlsruhe, the northern part of the Black Forest, Stuttgart with the car manufacturers of Mercedes and Porsche; I think many of your listeners may know those brands.

Jeff Rathke

Clearly someone for whom international trade is a big issue. We are speaking on June 2, and I point out the date because just later this week, June 5, we will have a visit of the German Chancellor Friedrich Merz in Washington, where he will be meeting with President Donald Trump and, of course, trade is going to be a big part of their discussions, I assume.

We are in an extraordinary period of transatlantic trade relations. Peter Rashish, vice president of AGI, and I are pleased to have this opportunity to talk with you. The Trump administration is trying to reduce the bilateral trade deficit in goods with the European Union, and the tariff measures by the Trump administration have garnered widespread criticism and attention. How do you think the European Union should respond to this situation, Daniel? Are they doing the right thing? What should the European response look like, in your view?

Daniel Caspary

What you could have seen in the past was that the European Commission and the European member states stayed very calm. I think that was the good reaction, because we see how strongly our supply chains are intervened across the Atlantic. We see the big interdependence. And we, of course, as Europeans, see that from our perspective, our biggest problem is not on the other side of the Atlantic but is somewhere in Asia, when we talk about China, for instance, and therefore the European Union has a big, big interest to keep up the strong relations with the United States on the one hand on security issues but on the other hand, on trade. When you talk about the trade deficit, I think it’s a big problem that in the debate it only seems to be the problem concerning goods where yes, de facto, we have a trade balance surplus from the European perspective of about €160 billion a year. But on the other hand, we have of course services where the United States have a big trade surplus in relation to the Eur...