Changes for Spain as Biden takes control of the US
The president-elect and his vice president took office on Wednesday in a ceremony that was not attended by the outgoing president Donald Trump, who spent his last day locked up in the White House.
His schedule had said he would work “late” and make “many calls” and have “many meetings”
It is believed that the change of government in the US will lead to the resumption of a closer relationship with Europe. But not everything will be so simple. This is all we can expect with regard to how the change of president in the US will affect Spain.
Biden is an old connoisseur of Spain, which he has already said he would like to visit for a longer period of time, spending “two months” there.
The transfer of power in the US will leave many Spanish farmers holding their breath. The trade war between Trump and Brussels has become more intense in the last two years. The case dates back to 2004 when Boeing and Airbus began accusing each other of receiving too much aid from their respective administrations.
In June of last year, the Trump administration was considering imposing new tariffs on the import of Spanish products, in addition to French, German, or British goods.
Bloomberg detailed at the time that it would affect 3.1 billion dollars in goods -more than 2.7 billion euros at the exchange rate at the time- and would focus mainly on olives, alcoholic beverages, fashion, or trucks.
These would not be the first tariffs. Spanish wines and oils are still taxed at 25% in a decision by the Trump Trade Office that did not change last summer either. They began to be applied in October 2019 and the economic impact in Spain was calculated at around 900 million euros.
Once Biden’s victory in the U.S. election was confirmed, the Defense Ministry officials in Spain, led by Margarita Robles, breathed a sigh of relief. This ball of oxygen, as interpreted by the Spanish government, will soften and facilitate relations with the US, which have always been indispensable.
Indispensable, among other things, because there are US army bases on the peninsula, for example in the Andalusian municipalities of Rota and Morón. The agreement that allows these pieces of U.S. land to be on Spanish soil has been automatically renewed because neither of the two parties has shown any opposition to it.
However, it has only been extended for one more year, so in 2021 the negotiations between the Robles department and the new U.S. administration will have to continue.
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