Day 998: Trump is desperate for a trade deal with China and Beijing knows it
Leverage is everything in deal-making, and right now Donald Trump has none of it.
After a trade war that has spanned well over a year with China, both nations have been severely impacted. The U.S. first imposed tariffs on Chinese goods, and Beijing responded reciprocally. Domestically, the results have been utterly predictable: market instability, higher prices on goods and substantial losses for American farmers with nowhere to export crops.
Amid a flurry of foreign policy failures, Trump is desperately hunting for anything close to a win. He’s been sycophantically and transparently sucking up to China for weeks, with the aim of negotiating a trade deal.
Sunday, he announced that the first part of a deal was in place.
In response to Trump’s announcement, the stock market didn’t budge, having grown accustomed to these games.
And, Beijing, who surely smells the desperation on Trump, said not so fast.
China wants to hold more talks this month to hammer out the details of the “phase one” trade deal touted by Donald Trump before Xi Jinping agrees to sign it, according to people familiar with the matter.
The U.S. and China have emerged from last week’s talks with different takes on what’s in the accord and how close they are to signing a document. Trump said “we’ve come to a deal, pretty much, subject to getting it written” and indicated it might take several more weeks of negotiation. China’s Ministry of Commerce merely said that “the two sides have made substantial progress” and “agreed to work together in the direction of a final agreement.” The state-run Xinhua news agency didn’t mention a deal either.
China is going to squeeze Trump on this deal, and there’s absolutely nothing he can do about it. The Communist Party is in power in China no matter what happens in the short-term. But Trump needs a deal before the 2020 election. He knows it. The GOP knows it. And most dangerously, China knows it.
998 days in, 464 to go
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