In meeting with Lula, Trump signals suspension of tariffs

The President of the United States, Donald Trump, said this Sunday (26), in a meeting with Brazilian Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT), that the trade tariffs applied to Brazil can be negotiated “very quickly”, although he disagreed when asked what the conditions for the measure would be.

On Saturday (25), he had stated that he could reduce tariffs to Brazil if there were “suitable circumstances”.

The bilateral meeting took place in Kuala Lampur, Malaysia, from 3:30 pm local time (4:30 am in Brasília), in parallel with the Leaders’ Summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean).

“We are going to discuss it for a while and we will probably reach a conclusion very quickly”, he stated at the entrance of the meeting with Lula, when journalists were still present.

“I think we will be able to reach the very good agreements that we have been talking about, and I think we will end up having a very good relationship,” he added.

Asked whether a change in the sentences against former president Jair Bolsonaro (PL) would be one of the conditions for negotiations with the Brazilian government, the American leader said that this was none of the journalists’ business.

“I like Bolsonaro. He’s a good guy. We’re bothered by the penalties against him,” he stated.

The Brazilian president, however, asked that the press be removed from the room to begin a conversation behind closed doors. “The press will have good news as soon as the meeting ends. Before, it’s just guesses,” he said.

“Brazil is interested in having an extraordinary relationship with the United States, as we have had for 201 years. There is no reason for disagreement between Brazil and the United States,” said the PT member.

“When two presidents sit at the table, each one raises their problems, the natural tendency is to move towards an agreement. Before coming here I said that I was very optimistic about the possibility of moving forward towards having a more civilized relationship with the United States and we intend to maintain it.”

Brazil and the United States are expected to have another meeting this Sunday in Malaysia

During the closed-door negotiation, Trump stated that he should suspend the tariffs, according to Foreign Affairs Minister Mauro Vieira, who participated in the meeting. “We are going to have negotiations, conversations, given that the tariff is applied to a country that does not have a surplus in the United States,” the minister told journalists after the meeting.

Also according to Vieira, a new meeting between representatives of the Brazilian and American governments should take place this Sunday night in Malaysia. The time and location have not yet been defined.

“Trump declared that he will instruct his team to begin a bilateral negotiation process, which should begin today – as everything is supposed to be resolved in a short time,” he stated.

Still according to the chancellor, the American president showed interest in visiting Brazil, and Lula also stated that he will “with pleasure” go to the USA in the future.

Lula classified the meeting, which lasted around 45 minutes, as “excellent” and said that the discussion was “frank and constructive”.

“I had a great meeting with President Trump this Sunday afternoon, in Malaysia. We discussed the bilateral trade and economic agenda in a frank and constructive way”, declared the president, on X, after the meeting.

“We agreed that our teams will meet immediately to move forward in finding solutions to tariffs and sanctions against Brazilian authorities,” he continued.

The executive secretary of the Ministry of Development, Industry, Commerce and Services (MDIC), Márcio Elias Rosa, said that the dialogue was “frank”.

“President Lula made it clear that the motivation used by the United States to impose increased tariffs on the rest of the world does not apply to Brazil due to the trade balance surplus. He also showed that our trade agenda and diplomatic relations have always been very good”, he said.

Despite saying he was “bothered” by the sentences against Bolsonaro, the topic was not on the meeting’s agenda, according to the Brazilian government.

At the meeting, Trump was accompanied by his secretaries of State, Marco Rubio, and Secretary of Treasury, Scott Bessent, and Trade Representative, Jamieson Greer. Alongside Lula, in addition to Vieira and Elias Rosa, ambassador Audo Faleiro, from the special advisory department of the Presidency of the Republic, also participated.

Lula has been in Kuala Lumpur for a few days, where on Saturday he met with Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim, after a trip to Indonesia, in search of trade agreements to mitigate the impact of US tariffs.

Trump and Lula met for the first time in the corridors of the last UN General Assembly, held in September in New York, and began a thaw that continued on October 6 with a “friendly” call, in which the Brazilian proposed to the American a meeting within the scope of the Asean Summit, which began this Sunday and ends on Tuesday (28).

The American president will participate in the bloc’s meetings only on this first day and will continue on Monday (27) to Japan, before traveling to South Korea.

Lula will have bilateral meetings with the Prime Minister of Singapore, Lawrence Wong, and the Prime Minister of Vietnam, Pham Minh Chinh, this Sunday, before official Asean activities.

In the evening, he participated in a dinner hosted by the President of the European Council, António Costa, with the presence of the President of South Africa, Cyril Ramaphosa, and the Prime Minister of Canada, Mark Carney.