US Tariff Investigation 2026: 60 Countries, Forced Labor Claims and the EU Trade Fight

The US administration has launched an investigation into 60 countries — including the European Union — to determine whether they are permitting imports of goods produced with forced labor, setting the stage for new tariffs ranging from 10% to 12.5% and reopening a trade fight many assumed was settled, according to Deloitte’s Weekly Global Economic Update.

From Historic Tariffs to Legal Setbacks to a New Workaround

The administration spent much of 2025 attempting to construct a new global trading regime built around historically high tariffs and the constant threat of additional duties. That effort hit turbulence in 2026 when court decisions challenged the legality of certain tariff actions. Rather than retreat, the administration has pivoted to a forced-labor investigation as an alternative legal basis for imposing new duties — a maneuver that effectively route around the same legal constraints that felled its earlier tariff architecture, according to Deloitte’s tracking of the policy shift.

TD Economics notes the new Section 301 tariffs, covering the 60 countries under investigation, are set to take effect in late July 2026, replacing temporary Section 122 tariffs that had themselves replaced earlier IEEPA-based tariffs back in February — a rapid succession of legal justifications that underscores how central tariff policy remains to the administration’s trade strategy despite repeated judicial pushback, according to TD’s Canadian Quarterly Economic Forecast.

The EU Is Back on the List

Perhaps the most consequential detail is the inclusion of the European Union among the 60 countries under investigation, despite the US and EU having reached a trade agreement the previous year that was subsequently ratified by the European Parliament. The renewed scrutiny threatens to reopen a trade relationship both sides had treated as stabilized, introducing fresh uncertainty for European exporters already navigating elevated energy costs tied to the Middle East conflict.

The Broader Tariff Landscape Businesses Are Now Operating In

TD Economics estimates that despite the legal churn, the overall effective US tariff rate is likely to hold steady around 10% once the new Section 301 measures take effect — meaning that for most businesses, “peak uncertainty” over the shape of US trade policy is now behind them even if the specific legal mechanism keeps changing. Canadian exports, by comparison, face a lower roughly 6% average effective tariff rate given extensive CUSMA-compliance exemptions, according to RBC’s tariff impact analysis.

Knock-On Effects Across Asia and North America

The tariff churn has already reshaped global trade flows. RBC Economics notes that global trade patterns have reoriented dramatically to route around higher-tariff regions such as China, even as global trade volumes overall continued to rise through 2025 and the US trade deficit widened slightly despite the tariff push, according to RBC’s year-one tariff retrospective. For Asian exporters, exposure to the US market varies widely — from around 30% of exports for Vietnam to roughly 15% for China — meaning the forced-labor investigation’s ultimate impact will fall unevenly depending on each economy’s US trade concentration.

What Comes Next

With the investigation’s findings expected to determine tariff levels within the 10%-12.5% range for affected countries, businesses across the EU, and potentially exporters in Asia and Latin America caught up in the 60-country review, face a fresh compliance burden: documenting labor-sourcing practices deep into their supply chains to avoid punitive duties, even in sectors with no direct history of forced-labor allegations.