Sen. Perdue Talks Tariffs At Cartersville Budweiser Plant
Georgia Sen. David Perdue visited a Budweiser plant in Cartersville north of Atlanta Friday, where he addressed concerns about tariffs instated by President Donald Trump.
Alex Brandon / Associated Press file
President Donald Trump’s tariffs on some steel and aluminum imports have sparked complaints from a range of industries, including brewers who use aluminum to can beer.
Georgia Sen. David Perdue visited a Budweiser plant in Cartersville north of Atlanta Friday, where those tariffs were top of mind.
Perdue, a Republican, assured Budweiser employees that Trump’s plan is working, even though the senator said it’s not what he would have done.
“I think the president’s instincts are pretty good. I might have argued a different tactic on tariffs, but so far, I have to say, with South Korea, Mexico, Canada and the European Union it seems to be working,” he said.
In a town hall at the plant, Perdue called tariffs “inefficient,” and said he would have preferred “direct negotiation on specific issues within industries.”
However, he said Trump’s strategy is forcing other countries to the negotiating table.
Perdue saidAmericans will have to endure some “short-term pain” to tackle the bigger issue of what he sees as a trade imbalance. His message to those Americans? “Well I tell them to hang in there. This is an issue: do they want a level playing field or not?”
Budweiser’s parent company Anheuser-Busch publicly opposes the aluminum tariffs. In a statement, the company called them “an additional tax on the U.S. beer industry and these additional taxes will increase the cost of brewing in the U.S.”
The company’s trade association, the Beer Institute, has said aluminum tariffs could raise the annual cost of beer production in the U.S. by about $350 million, which could show up in beer prices in stores.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has also come out against the tariff strategy, calling it “the wrong approach.” In a previous interview, the Georgia Chamber echoed the sentiment.
On Friday, China announced it would impose additional retaliatory tariffs on $60 billion worth of U.S. products if the Trump administration follows through on threats to tax even more Chinese goods.
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