Trump threatens 200% tariffs on French wine and champagne
US President Donald Trump has threatened to slap 200 per cent tariffs on French wine and champagne after Paris signalled it would not join a new US-backed “Board of Peace”. The board was presented as a mechanism to oversee the reconstruction of Gaza, but French officials say its mandate extends well beyond the Palestinian territory, which appears to have raised concerns.
“I’ll put a 200 per cent tariff on his wines and champagnes. And he’ll join. But he doesn’t have to join,” Trump said on Monday, targeting French President Emmanuel Macron. A source close to Macron said France “does not intend to answer favourably” to the invitation, adding that the board’s charter “goes beyond the sole framework of Gaza”. On Tuesday, the same source described Trump’s tariff threats as “unacceptable and ineffective”.
The dispute unfolded as Macron quietly sought to lower the temperature through diplomacy. In a private message sent to Trump and later posted by the US president on his Truth Social platform, Macron proposed organising a G7 meeting in Paris on Thursday, on the margins of the World Economic Forum in Davos.
In the message, Macron suggested that Russia could be invited to attend discussions on the sidelines, alongside Ukraine and Denmark. Greenland, which Trump has repeatedly targeted in rhetoric and trade threats, was also raised as a topic for discussion. “My friend, we are totally in line on Syria. We can do great things on Iran. I do not understand what you are doing on Greenland,” Macron wrote, according to the text shared by Trump. He added that Paris could host a meeting “after Davos on Thursday afternoon”.
An official close to the French president confirmed the message was genuine and said it demonstrated Macron’s consistency, “both in public and in private”. The official stressed that France views respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity as “non-negotiable”, a clear reference to Greenland. Europe is now weighing possible countermeasures after Trump threatened tariffs against eight European countries in what officials see as an attempt to pressure the European Union over Greenland.
