Brussels decision-making is hard to understand – that’s no secret. And it’s all the more confusing when, time and again, headlines announce the “end of negotiations” on a Brussels-Washington trade deal that had been “sealed” last summer.
For non-trade hawks – or people with lives and jobs that don’t spiral around tariff drama with Washington – the latest developments this week might be somewhat confusing.
The EU-US trade agreement is an undeniably big deal. But in case the whole Turnberry affair has been complicated in the various rounds of negotiations and brinksmanship, here’s what exactly was negotiated this week in Brussels, and why it doesn’t mean the transatlantic trade war is over.
The root of all evil: trade surplus
Trump returned to the White House convinced that America’s trade relationships were “unfair” and that tariffs are the cure to all economic problems. In the EU’s case, the 27-member bloc does sell more goods to the US than vice versa.
And although on services, America runs a surplus, Trump doesn’t think that trading services “is real trade,” says David Henig, a UK-based trade expert at the European Centre for International Political Economy.
The US president also points to products barred from the EU market because of production standards – chlorine-washed chicken, hormone-treated beef and the like.
American cars, too, are often either not authorised for the EU market or simply not desired by consumers. Think gigantic oil-thirsty pick-up trucks trying to navigate cobblestoned medieval European city centres.
“He brings it together with the surplus. Therefore, it’s unfair. Therefore, ‘I need to take action’,” Henig said.
That “action” escalated quickly. Threatened tariffs jumped from 20% on Trump’s so-called “Liberation Day” in April 2025 to warnings of 200% duties on champagne.
After months of negotiations came the famous handshake agreement at the end of July in Scotland, at Trump’s golf resort in Turnberry, which lowered tariffs to 15% if the EU lowered its own tariffs to zero.
The deal that never was
But Turnberry was never a free trade agreement. It was essentially a political handshake dressed up as an all-powerful “joint statement” committing the EU to lowering tariffs and buying billions in US energy, along with other pledges on issues that Brussels cannot even fully control.
The EU then had to implement its side of the bargain through legislation, lowering tariffs on hundreds of industrial and agricultural products. And that’s where Parliament entered the picture.
MEPs never liked the deal. Parliament’s concerns became even stronger after Washington appeared to violate its own Turnberry commitments by hiking tariffs on some steel and aluminium products above the agreed 15%.
Socialist lead negotiator Bernd Lange therefore pushed for tougher safeguards, including a “sunrise clause” forcing the Commission to suspend EU tariff cuts if the US failed to comply.
The demands seemed reasonable. If Brussels is legally implementing the deal, why should Washington be allowed to freestyle its way through it?
Inside the overnight trilogue chaos
That is what made this week’s three-way institutional negotiations so messy. Parliament, the Council and the Commission entered one of those classic Brussels overnight bargaining sessions where everyone publicly says talks are “constructive” while privately threatening institutional war over one verb in a legal paragraph.
Parliament was pushing for wording that would have forced the Commission to automatically suspend tariff reductions if the US failed to lower steel tariffs as promised, sources told Euractiv.
But member states were terrified of provoking Trump further. EU governments feared that attaching too many conditions to the handshake agreement could trigger another tariff tantrum from Washington just as the bloc is trying to stabilise relations.
According to Henig, Parliament’s broader objective was also about preserving leverage for future negotiations and making sure “the Commission doesn’t give too much away.”
However, somewhere in the middle of the night, the Council got its way and the wording was watered down. The final compromise merely “empowers” the Commission to act. In practice, Brussels can retaliate, but it doesn’t have to.
Still, MEPs considered it better than the original situation of having no conditions attached to the deal. Parliament also secured safeguard mechanisms and an expiry date in December 2029.
Lange seemed satisfied with the outcome. “You can’t always get what you want, but if you try sometimes, you get what you need,” the rock-loving MEP said, quoting the Rolling Stones.
So… Is it finally over?
Probably not. Turnberry is not really compliant with World Trade Organisation rules and, so far, the legal basis in Washington has been shaky. “All of the US deals are legally questionable,” Henig said.
Even after institutions finally reached a compromise, Henig warned that the EU will have “no more confidence that everything will be fine than it did before.”
The agreement still needs final votes in Parliament and approval by member states. And even if all that happens, nobody in Brussels really believes the tariff drama with Washington will disappear.
So this is far from being the end of it all. More likely it is the start of a new phase of the permanent negotiation state between Brussels and Washington.
See the original of this report by Sofia Sanchez Manzanaro here.