America's 'fentanyl tariff': A logical fallacy and strategic miscalculation

Editor's note: Xin Ping is a commentator on international affairs, writing regularly for Xinhua News Agency, Global Times, China Daily, CGTN, etc. The article reflects the author's views and not necessarily those of CGTN.

On February 1, the U.S. government imposed a 10 percent tariff on Chinese imports, justifying the move as a response to "the direct flow of fentanyl and other synthetic opioids from China." When the tariffs were abruptly doubled to 20 percent on March 3, many saw this as a political deflection from systemic domestic failures.

Economically, the measure scapegoats China for America's homegrown opioid crisis while ignoring domestic market distortions and regulatory gaps. Strategically, it recycles the China containment strategy from the first Donald Trump administration – a self-defeating approach that could erode U.S. economic competitiveness and global influence.

Eroding counter-narcotics cooperation

The China-U.S. counter-narcotics partnership had produced tangible results. At Washington's request, China implemented sweeping controls in 2019, classifying all fentanyl-related substances as regulated drugs and establishing a monitoring framework spanning production, distribution and exports. Joint operations facilitated intelligence-sharing, case coordination and technical exchanges, achieving measurable progress.

Rahul Gupta, Director of the White House Office of National Drug Policy, publicly acknowledged China's efforts, saying during his 2024 visit to China that "the recent joint law enforcement action was a significant step," adding that it "will carry us forward." Data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) for the fourth quarter of 2024 showed fentanyl-related deaths dropping at the steepest rate since records began, validating the partnership's effectiveness.

Yet despite these gains, Washington's fentanyl tariffs threaten to dismantle this critical cooperation. Such unilateral actions risk not only reviving the opioid scourge but also destabilizing overall bilateral ties.

America's fentanyl crisis: A domestic failure

America's fentanyl epidemic originated in the 1990s, when pharmaceutical giants lobbied Congress, funded biased research and exploited healthcare protocols to promote opioid overprescription. Princeton economist Anne Case's landmark study documents how corporate profit-driven motives overrode patient safety, sparking a deadly "painkiller culture."

The crisis deepened as manufacturing outsourcing caused mass layoffs and middle-class erosion, leaving millions in economic despair. With inadequate social safeguards, many turned to drugs, catapulting fentanyl overdoses to the leading cause of U.S. deaths by 2024, surpassing both car crashes and gun fatalities.

This fundamentally domestic crisis exposes Washington's dereliction. Simply blaming external actors instead of pursuing healthcare and welfare reforms constitutes a failure of accountability and portends new crises from unregulated capitalism.

Geopolitics disguised as public health

Behind the health pretext lies a transparent economic decoupling agenda: curbing Chinese exports, reshoring industries and containing China's rise. Regardless of their efficacy, tariffs primarily burden U.S. households and global markets.

A study by the University of Chicago estimated that tariffs imposed by the first Trump administration led to a 12-percent increase in washing machine prices. Joe Biden continued to impose tariffs, which increased consumer costs by around $51 billion per year, according to a survey based on 2022 imports. In 2024, the U.S. inflation rate continued to rise to around 3.1 percent, far above the Federal Reserve's 2 percent target.

Any trade disruption between China and the U.S., the world's top two economies, threatens global stability. Economic modeling by the Peterson Institute for International Economics shows that revoking China's permanent normal trade relations (PNTR) status "would cause higher inflation and a short-term decline in U.S. gross domestic product relative to baseline from which the economy never fully recovers."

History's cautionary tale

The role of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act (1930) in prolonging the Great Depression offers a dire precedent. As Thomas Friedman observes, Trump's tariffs on Canada, China and Mexico may well be "the dumbest trade war in history."

Persisting with unilateralism and hegemony endangers both domestic problem-solving and global stability. Decades of diplomatic practice attest that Constructive dialogue – not confrontation – remains the proven path to mutual benefit. 

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