MIAMI — The United States share of Brazilian exports hit a historic low in the first quarter of 2026 — 9.4%, the lowest figure ever recorded in the bilateral trade relationship. The number arrived as the Trump administration proposed yet another round of tariffs on Brazilian goods on June 2, this time a 25% levy under a Section 301 investigation — and as Brazil, the largest economy in Latin America, was accelerating a trade pivot toward China that Washington’s own tariff campaign appears to have accelerated.
For Miami — the city through which more Latin American trade, capital, and commerce flows than any other in the United States — the deterioration of U.S.-Brazil relations is not minute. It is a business reality arriving in the city’s port data, banking flows, and investment pipeline.
A Year of Escalation
The tariff timeline between Washington and Brasília reads like a slow-motion collision. In April 2025, Trump imposed a 10% tariff on Brazil as part of the administration’s “Liberation Day” tariffs on nearly every country in the world. Then in July 2025, Trump imposed an additional 40% tariff on Brazil specifically, raising duties on products not affected by other Section 232 measures.
The impact was immediate and concrete. Brazil is the main supplier of bleached eucalyptus kraft pulp to the United States, accounting for 82.5% of U.S. imports of that product. Brazil also exported 3.4 million tonnes of steel slab to the U.S. in 2024, representing approximately 60% of total U.S. steel slab imports.
Both sectors were directly hit.
A February 2026 U.S. Supreme Court decision terminating the Trump administration’s tariffs issued under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act significantly shook up the picture — reducing the tariff on Brazilian products previously exposed to 50% back to 10%. The reprieve was short-lived.
On June 2, 2026, the Trump administration proposed new tariffs of up to 25% on imports from Brazil following a Section 301 investigation — a trade enforcement mechanism that allows the United States to respond to foreign practices deemed unreasonable, discriminatory, or harmful to American businesses.
U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said the investigation was launched at the direction of President Trump and concluded that Brazil’s practices warranted further trade measures, citing concerns related to Brazil’s anti-corruption enforcement policies, intellectual property protections, ethanol market access restrictions, and issues surrounding illegal deforestation.
Lula responded with barely concealed fury. In the first quarter of 2026, the U.S. share of Brazilian exports reached the lowest value in the historical series, totaling 9.4% — a direct consequence of the Trump administration's tariff campaign.
Brazil’s Pivot to China
Washington’s tariff strategy appears to have exacerbated Brazil’s pivot from the Western Hemisphere. Rather than pressuring Brazil into concessions, the escalating duties accelerated Brazil’s trade diversification away from the United States — and toward China.
Despite the tariffs, Brazil closed 2025 with record exports — up $11.6 billion from 2024 — even as shipments to the United States fell $2.6 billion. Beijing announced its intention to increase imports of Brazilian coffee, meat, and grain, signaling China’s readiness to absorb commodities displaced from U.S. markets.
Washington’s tariff campaign produced several unintended strategic effects in Brazil. The belief that economic pressure would weaken President Lula domestically proved questionable — instead, external pressure reinforced nationalist narratives, bolstered Lula’s political standing among key constituencies, and created cross-ideological backing around themes of sovereignty and economic autonomy.
The trade reconfiguration yields mixed business impacts: export revenue resilience via China offsets U.S. losses, but it widens the U.S.-Brazil trade deficit and introduces China dependency risks. The irony is not lost on analysts: a tariff campaign designed to reduce Chinese influence in Latin America’s largest economy has instead pushed Brazil more firmly into Beijing’s trade orbit.
What It Means for Miami
Miami’s relationship with Brazil is deep, structural, and commercially significant. The city handles a substantial share of U.S.-Brazil air cargo, serves as the primary gateway for Brazilian tourists and business travelers to the United States, and hosts a significant Brazilian banking, investment, and business presence concentrated in Brickell and Coral Gables.
The collapse of U.S.-Brazil trade flows touches that ecosystem directly. Brazilian exports of coffee, granite, pulp, and steel that once moved through Miami’s port and logistics network are now being rerouted toward Chinese and Asian markets.
Brazilian high-net-worth individuals and companies, navigating an increasingly adversarial bilateral relationship, are reconsidering the degree to which Miami serves as their primary U.S. hub.
India has also moved into the space Washington is vacating. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Lula agreed in February 2026 to cooperate in rare earth and critical minerals mining, aiming to boost trade beyond the $20 billion target by 2030 and expand the India-Mercosur Preferential Trading Agreement.
Brazil is hedging in every direction simultaneously — and the United States, once its primary export market and investment source, is no longer the anchor of that strategy.
October & the Path Forward
The bilateral relationship has one potential reset point on the horizon: Brazil’s October 2 presidential election, in which Flávio Bolsonaro and Lula are running in a statistical dead heat. A Bolsonaro victory would almost certainly produce a rapid normalization of U.S.-Brazil trade relations — tariff rollbacks, security cooperation agreements, and a bilateral posture aligned with Washington's hemispheric agenda.
A Lula victory would mean four more years of the current trajectory — escalating tariff disputes, deepening China trade ties, PCC and CV terrorist designation tensions, and a bilateral relationship that has deteriorated more severely in eighteen months than at any point in the modern democratic era.
The proposed 25% tariffs remain subject to a public comment period and have not yet been formally implemented. But the direction of travel is clear. Washington and Brasília are in the most adversarial trade relationship in their shared history — and Miami, positioned squarely between them, is watching its most important South American commercial relationship slowly fracture.
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Sociedad Media is a Miami-based independent digital news publication covering the latest developments across Latin American politics & culture.
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