FILE PHOTO: Children's furniture is seen displayed in a showroom in New York, U.S., May 29, 2019. REUTERS/Mike Segar/File Photo

By David Shepardson and David Lawder

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -President Donald Trump said on Friday his administration will conduct a "major" tariff investigation on furniture entering the United States, a step toward imposing higher duties on a sector already seeing tariff-fueled price increases.

"Furniture coming from other Countries into the United States will be Tariffed at a Rate yet to be determined," Trump said in a post on Truth Social.

Furniture retailer RH -- previously known as Restoration Hardware -- shares fell 7.5% in after-hours trading on Trump's announcement.

Trump said the investigation will be completed within the next 50 days but other national security probes have taken significantly longer than that. A White House official confirmed that it would be conducted under the Section 232 national security statute.

The probe could serve as a backstop legal basis for existing tariffs if a federal appeals court strikes down "reciprocal" duties that Trump imposed on a broad range of U.S. trading partners in April, as well as import taxes imposed in February against China, Canada and Mexico.

"This will bring the Furniture Business back to North Carolina, South Carolina, Michigan, and States all across the Union," Trump said.

Furniture and wood products manufacturing -- which employed 1.2 million people in 1979 -- has fallen from 681,000 in 2000 to 340,000 today, according to government statistics.

The United States imported about $25.5 billion in furniture in 2024, up 7% over 2023, with about 60% of those imports coming from Vietnam and China, according to Furniture Today, a trade publication.

New tariffs on imports from furniture-producing countries helped push up consumer prices for home furnishings by a steep 0.7% in July, according to Commerce Department data, though overall consumer price inflation was restrained by lower gasoline prices.

INDUSTRY OPPOSITION

The American Home Furnishings Alliance, a trade group representing domestic furniture manufacturers and importers, including many companies that do both, had no immediate comment on Trump's announcement.

But the High Point, North Carolina-based AHFA in April led an industry coalition in opposing new tariffs under Trump's ongoing Section 232 investigation into lumber and wood products imports.

"As a strictly legal matter, there is no rational relationship between imports of wood products or furniture and the national security of the United States," the group said in written comments to the Commerce Department.

"Second, no amount of tariffs will bring back American furniture manufacturing back to its prior levels. Tariffs will harm manufacturing still being done in the United States."

Furniture would be the latest imported products targeted for a national security investigation by the Trump administration. On Thursday, it announced a national security probe into imported wind turbines and has previously targeted copper and other metals.

The department has opened numerous probes into the national security ramifications of imports of airplanes, semiconductors, pharmaceuticals, heavy trucks, timber and lumber, critical minerals and drones.

The European Union won some relief from these potential new Section 232 tariffs as part of a joint statement on Thursday fleshing out their trade deal. The two sides agreed to limit any new U.S. tariffs on EU pharmaceuticals, lumber and semiconductors to the general 15% rate applied to most products from the bloc and will shield EU aircraft and parts, generic pharmaceuticals and drug chemical precursors from all new tariffs.

(Reporting by Ismail Shakil and Bhargav Acharya; editing by Ryan Patrick Jones, Caitlin Webber and Diane Craft)