A group of uninhabited Australian islands near Antarctica has been pulled into Donald Trump’s tariff drive, even though the territory has no permanent residents and no obvious role in global trade.
The Guardian reported on April 3 that Heard Island and McDonald Islands, an external territory of Australia, were among the places listed by the White House for a 10% tariff on goods. The islands are barren volcanic outcrops covered in glaciers and are said to be reachable only by a two-week boat trip from Perth.
The most striking feature of the territory is that nobody lives there. The report said the last known human visit was nearly 10 years ago. Yet the islands still appeared in a tariff list that also singled out several other Australian external territories, including Norfolk Island, Christmas Island and the Cocos (Keeling) Islands.
Anthony Albanese, Australia’s prime minister, reacted with disbelief. "Nowhere on Earth is safe," he said, capturing the political absurdity of including uninhabited islands in a trade measure aimed at imports.
The report also noted that Norfolk Island, which has 2,188 residents, was assigned a 29% tariff, far above the 10% rate attached to the rest of Australia. George Plant, the island’s administrator, disputed the trade figures cited in the report and said there were no known exports to the United States and no known trade barriers on goods coming into Norfolk Island.
The evidence is even stranger for Heard Island and McDonald Islands. The territory does have a fishery, but no buildings or human habitation. The Guardian said World Bank data showed the United States imported $1.4 million of products from the territory in 2022, mostly listed as machinery and electrical goods, although it was not clear what those goods actually were. In the five years before that, imports were listed at anywhere from $15,000 to $325,000 a year.
That oddity points to a broader problem in tariff design: trade lists built on country codes and customs entries can sweep in places that have little or no commercial reality. In this case, the political message appears to matter more than the economic detail. Trump’s tariffs are being presented as a comprehensive trade confrontation, and the inclusion of remote Australian territories shows how wide the net has been cast.
Canberra has not yet received a clear explanation for why the islands were included. The Guardian said the White House, Australia’s foreign ministry and the Australian Antarctic Division were all contacted for comment. The lack of detail leaves the islands as a symbol of the administrative confusion surrounding the tariff rollout as much as a practical target of trade policy.
