Trump Cut U.S. Tariffs on India From 50% to 18%. Modi Agreed to Stop Buying Russian Oil and Bring Tariffs on American Goods to Zero.
- 50% → 18% U.S. tariff reduction on Indian imports — from 50% combined IEEPA rate to 18% under the new framework — White House / CNBC
- → ZERO India's commitment on tariffs for U.S. industrial goods and a wide range of food and agricultural products — White House Fact Sheet
- Russian oil — India commits to stop purchasing, a key geopolitical win linked directly to tariff relief — Al Jazeera / Bloomberg
- February 2, 2026 — announcement date; President Trump posted details on social media before the formal White House release — CNBC
On February 2, 2026, President Trump and Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a bilateral interim trade agreement that immediately slashed U.S. tariffs on Indian imports — and extracted a meaningful geopolitical commitment from India in return: an end to Indian purchases of Russian oil.
The framework represents one of the most significant trade breakthroughs of Trump’s second term — linking tariff relief to the Russia-Ukraine economic pressure campaign in a way no prior administration had managed with India, which had been a persistent buyer of discounted Russian crude since the 2022 invasion.
Trump removed the additional 25% tariff surcharge on Indian imports in recognition of India’s commitment to stop purchasing Russian oil. The overall U.S. tariff rate on India dropped from 50% — a combined IEEPA rate — to 25%, with a further reduction to 18% to follow “promptly.”
In exchange, India agreed to eliminate tariffs on U.S. industrial goods and a wide range of American food and agricultural products — including dried distillers’ grains, red sorghum, tree nuts, fresh and processed fruit, soybean oil, wine, and spirits. India’s stated goal: bringing tariff and non-tariff barriers on American goods “to ZERO.”
Modi additionally committed to purchasing American products “at a much higher level” and to buying significant quantities of U.S. energy — potentially including LNG and oil — as a substitute for Russian crude.
India had been one of Russia’s most important customers for discounted crude oil since Russia’s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Western sanctions on Russian energy diverted oil flows — and India stepped in to buy at deep discounts, becoming Russia’s top crude customer in 2023 and 2024.
Trump’s deal threads a needle: removing Russian oil revenue (which funds the war) while simultaneously opening U.S. agricultural exports to India’s enormous market and improving bilateral trade terms.
Whether India fully implements the Russian oil commitment remains to be independently verified — the U.S. Trade Representative’s office acknowledged the deal is a “framework,” not a final binding agreement, and detailed terms remain under negotiation.
The U.S. Court of International Trade subsequently ruled that Trump’s 10% universal baseline tariff — applied to India and other countries under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act — was illegal. The ruling, from India’s DD News and trade legal outlets, complicates the tariff math underlying the deal.
The White House has signaled it will appeal the IEEPA tariff ruling, and the bilateral India deal is structured separately from the universal baseline, so the legal challenge doesn’t directly void the India-specific terms. But it introduces uncertainty into the broader tariff architecture that the India deal relies on for its baseline rate calculations.