For years we have laughed at the fact that the US does not know how to locate Spain. A threat of tariffs just cost us

He has recognized it on several occasions. If Donald Trump had to stick with one word, only one in the entire vast English lexicon, it would be tariff (tariff). “It’s the most beautiful word in the dictionary,” he confessed in October during an interview with Bloomberg, when the polls still threatened a technical tie with Kamala Harris. Yesterday, between signing and signing the decree, Trump threatened to show Spain how much he likes that term (tariff) in a drastic way: applying “100% tariffs”.

The curious thing is that there are serious doubts that when Trump spoke about Spain he really meant to refer to it. What’s more, everything indicates that such a threat responds to something that has little to do with the economy: a big skid.

An intense day in Washington. Yesterday was a hectic day in Washington. More than that of any other presidential inauguration. To the logical (and expected) hustle and bustle of the swearing-in of one of the most influential political positions on the planet, that of US President Donald Trump, he added intense legislative activity. Throughout the day he dedicated himself to signing executive orders, a barrage of decrees on topics as diverse as immigration, energy or federal employment.

The new tenant of the White House signed documents in a stadium, cheered by supporters, and also in a more orthodox environment: in the Oval Office. There he was also allowed to chat with journalists informally. And one of them took the opportunity to raise an issue that the Republican had already spoken about in the past: the defense spending of some NATO member countries.

Are we talking about defense or BRICS? The problem is that it’s not entirely clear that Trump understood the question. Or why he answered what he answered. In fact, in the absence of official clarification, everything indicates that what occurred from that moment on in the Oval Office was a strange confusion that ended with the new US president threatening to impose burdensome tariffs on Spain.

The reason? A difficult jump to follow between a question about investment in defense and the positioning of the BRICS countries, an international club to which Spain does not belong, despite Trump’s words. Of course, what happened has generated a stir and headlines. Inside and outside Spain.

And why this mess? Unraveling a mistake is not always easy, so it is best to follow the sequence of what happened in the Oval Office, something that does well ABCa medium that attributes the original question to Trump.

Basically, his journalist asked the new president what he expects from countries that, like Spain, do not reach the NATO objective of allocating 2% of their spending to Defense. A priori it was a simple question, from which no big headlines could be expected. The Republican has already demanded that the countries of the Atlantic Alliance dedicate 5% of their GDP to defense.

Upon hearing the question, Trump mentioned that Spain “is well below 5%” in terms of its contribution to military spending, but he immediately seemed to change the subject with a double plot jump that is difficult to follow: “And aren’t they a BRICS nation? Are they. Spain is a BRICS nation.

“At least 100% tariff”. Trump then asked journalists if they knew what “BRICS” was, but when one of them responded that Spain was not part of that club of countries, the new American president seemed to go off on a tangent. Of course, with a warning included: “You will discover it (…). If the BRICS nations want to do that, fine, but we are going to impose at least a 100% tariff on the business they do with the US.”

Trump (Sic). His literal response (collected by The Country) after pointing out that Spain’s military spending is very low is the following: “Are they a BRICS country? Well, they are a BRICS country. Spain. Do you know what a BRICS country is? You’ll find out. But if the BRICS countries They want to do that, that’s fine; but we are going to put at least a 100% tariff on the business they do with the US. Do you know what BRICS is? You know what I’m saying.

When the journalist asked if Spain risks suffering 100% tariffs, the president delved into his previous speech from the Oval Office: “As a BRICS country, yes. They will have a 100% tariff if they even continue to think about doing what they thought.” .And therefore they will give it up immediately, so China will give it up.”

But… What is BRICS? To begin with, the word is an acronym formed by the initials of five countries: Brazil, Russia, India and China, which formed the BRIC around 2006, and South Africa, a nation that was added years later to the bloc and gave rise to its current name. and the one that Donald Trump used yesterday: BRICS.

Over time, other countries have joined them, such as Egypt, the United Arab Emirates or Ethiopia; but not Spain. The BRICS countries were in fact presented as an alternative to the G7, a club of powers that includes the US and of which the EU is considered an “unaccounted member.”

Two doubts remain. Why does Trump believe that Spain is part of the BRICS club and what did he mean by “that” that his nations want to do? Only Trump has the answer, but everything indicates that the first is the result of a lexical-geographical mistake, of getting confused when attributing the ‘S’ of BRICS. The lyrics are from ‘South Africa’, but Trump has been able to wrongly relate it to ‘Spain’ despite Spain’s geographical distance from the rest of the nations that make up the bloc.

Regarding the second, Trump could be referring to one of the BRICS proposals. Its nations aspire to reduce their dependence on the US dollar and create a common BRICS currency, an idea that was raised after the 2008/2009 financial crisis and promoted during the summit of countries held in 2023. Trump has already spoken on the matter in the past, with notices about 100% tariffs like the ones he cited again yesterday when answering a question about Spain that had nothing to do with the topic.

Images | Gage Skidmore (Flickr) 1 and 2

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