(Bloomberg) -- The European Union intends to target 2.8 billion euros ($3.5 billion) of U.S. goods ranging from T-shirts and whiskey to motorcycles and ladders should President Donald Trump go ahead with his plan to impose a 25 percent tariff on foreign steel.
The EU aims to apply a tit-for-tat levy on a range of consumer, agricultural and steel goods imported from the U.S., according to a list drawn up by the European Commission and obtained by Bloomberg News. The commission, the EU’s executive arm, discussed the measures with representatives of the bloc’s governments at a meeting on Monday evening in Brussels.
The EU’s retaliatory list targets imports from the U.S. of shirts, jeans, cosmetics, other consumer goods, motorbikes and pleasure boats worth around 1 billion euros; orange juice, bourbon whiskey, corn and other agricultural products totaling 951 million euros and steel and other industrial products valued at 854 million euros.
Trump’s vow to curb U.S. imports of foreign steel has sparked opposition within his Republican Party and is based on a national-security argument that the EU dismisses. The White House threat risks provoking retaliation across the globe and a slew of complaints to the World Trade Organization, which has never ruled on a dispute involving trade restrictions justified on national-security grounds.