Brazilian senators seek to lift Trump tariffs

A delegation of eight senators met on Monday with company executives and representatives from the Brazil-U.S. Business Council in Washington, according to official sources cited by EFE, in an effort to ease Trump’s threat of imposing a 50% tariff on Brazilian products.

On Tuesday, they had “strategic meetings with U.S. authorities,” and on Wednesday they will be received at the headquarters of the Council of the Americas (COA), a U.S. business organization that promotes free trade. “We didn’t come here to confront. We came to talk,” said Senator Nelsinho Tad, head of the delegation, in a statement.

The mission has the support of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s government, which has reiterated its willingness to review the bilateral trade agenda, although —at least officially— it has encountered a closed door at the White House. “Trump doesn’t want to talk,” the Brazilian president said this week at a public event.