As Small Business Month kicks off, the Chamber of Commerce is speaking out against the Trump administration’s trade policy, saying recently imposed tariffs could do serious damage to America’s Main Street.
In a letter sent to the Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Wednesday, Suzanne Clark, president and CEO of the Chamber of Commerce, asks for an “automatic exclusion” from new tariffs for U.S. small businesses that import goods from abroad. Small businesses do not have the margin or capital reserves to survive an increase in tariffs, Clark wrote in the letter.
“The Chamber requests the administration take immediate action to save America’s small businesses and stave off a recession,” she wrote.
The Trump administration’s tariff policies are already weighing on growth and have raised the chances of a recession over the next 12 months, according to economists. Still, the International Monetary Fund said in April it does not expect the U.S. to enter a recession in 2025.
Clark added that tariffs could cause “irreparable harm” to the small business community if trade deals are not reached soon. Products from most countries are subject a 10% tariff, while products from China face a much steeper levy of up to 145%.
In an interview with Time magazine last week, President Trump said that trade deals would be reached in the “next three to four weeks.” In the meantime, small businesses are being forced to make difficult decisions about how to operate amid uncertainty as a result of on-and-off tariffs. One business owner who recently spoke to CBS MoneyWatch said she fears her company may have to close up shop for good.
Less room to maneuver
If tariffs persist, small business owners could end up passing on the cost to customers in the form of higher prices, as large corporations such as Amazon, Temu and Shein have done in recent weeks.
However, unlike huge corporations, any declines in consumer spending as a result of higher prices could spell financial disaster for many small businesses, which typically operate with tight margins. Roughly 43% of small business owners said their companies would not survive if they fell short on revenue for three to four months, according to a recent TD Bank survey.
“The Chamber is hearing from small business owners every day who are seeing their ability to survive endangered by the recent increased in tariff rates,” Clark said in the letter to the Trump administration.
Senator Ed Markey, ranking member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship, sent a letter last week to the Small Business Administration (SBA) calling on the Trump administration to grant tariff exemptions to Main Street enterprises.
“These businesses simply do not have the financial cushion to absorb price shocks or the resources to navigate sudden changes to an already complex supply channel,” Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat, wrote.
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