Trump signals trade truce with China
Divisions inside West Wing remain fierce
WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump is projecting a steely facade as he prepares for a critical meeting on trade this weekend with President Xi Jinping of China.
But behind his tough talk and threats of higher tariffs is a creeping anxiety about the costs of a prolonged trade war on the financial markets and the broader economy.
That could set the stage for a truce between the United States and China, several US officials said, in the form of an agreement that would delay new tariffs for several months while the world’s two largest economies try to work out the issues dividing them.
Such an outcome is not certain. Administration officials have expressed deep disappointment with China’s response to Trump’s pressure so far, characterising it as a list of proposals, transmitted in Chinese, which they say would do little to curb China’s theft of US technology or address its other predatory trade practices.
But Trump has signaled a new willingness to make a deal with Xi, a leader he has treated solicitously and will meet over dinner on Saturday in Buenos Aires, Argentina, after a summit meeting of leaders of the Group of 20 industrialised nations.
The gyrations in the stock market, the rise in interest rates and thousands of layoffs announced by GM this week have all rattled Trump, officials said, fueling his desire to emerge from his meal with Xi with something he can claim as a victory.
“There’s a good possibility that we can make a deal, and he is open to it,” Trump’s chief economic adviser, Larry Kudlow, said on Tuesday. “But if the meeting fails to produce a breakthrough. Trump is perfectly happy to stand on his tariff policies.”
At the moment, the administration plans to raise existing tariffs on $250 billion worth of Chinese goods, to 25% from 10%, on Jan 1.
Trump has also threatened to impose tariffs on an additional $267 billion of Chinese goods — a step many fear would plunge the two giants into a full-fledged economic Cold War.
If the two leaders agree to talks, however, officials said Trump would most likely postpone the increase to 25% and hold off on any new tariffs.
That would be similar to a deal he struck last July with the European Union, in which he agreed to delay auto tariffs in return for a pledge by Europe to buy American soybeans and natural gas.
The divisions inside the West Wing over trade remain fierce, as they have since the beginning of Trump’s presidency, and the contest for Trump’s ear will most likely continue until the moment he sits down with Xi in Argentina.
More mainstream advisers like Kudlow and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin are urging him to compromise, while hardliners like Peter Navarro, the director of the White House trade office, argue that he should keep ramping up the pressure on China until it folds.
Navarro, a favourite of Trump’s, had initially been excluded from the trip to Argentina, which led some to conclude that the hard-liners had lost ground.
Trump also sided against Navarro after Kudlow took a shot at him on television. But the US trade representative, Robert Lighthizer, has since authorised Navarro’s travel, raising the prospect that he will be on hand to encourage Trump to play hardball.
For Lighthizer, a veteran trade lawyer who has sued China for flooding the US market with cheap steel, the negotiations present an opportunity to drive a hard bargain.
But he also sees the meeting between Trump and Xi as a potential danger, especially if Trump opts for a quick handshake deal that would delay or scrap the new tariffs in hopes of buoying jittery markets, according to people familiar with his thinking.
Lighthizer also faces a challenge from Mnuchin, who has made it clear that he views himself as the nation’s chief negotiator, according to administration officials.
Navarro, people who know him say, regards Mnuchin as one of the circle of “globalists” pressuring Trump to abandon his promise to crack down on China.
Another US official said the major internal debate now was over the scope of a compromise Trump could offer Xi: postponing the increase in tariffs to 25%, plus the $267 billion in new tariffs — or only the new tariffs.
That underscores how much Trump’s position has changed from a few months ago, when he announced sweeping tariffs on China, asserted the Chinese were not yet ready to negotiate an agreement and declared that trade wars were “easy to win.”
Only two weeks ago, disagreements between China and the US over trade scuttled attempts to produce a joint communique after an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) meeting.
Trump is acutely aware of the threat an economic downturn poses to the foundation of his presidency. That has made him receptive to the counsel of moderates like Mnuchin and Kudlow, as well as outsiders like the Wall Street financier Stephen A. Schwarzman who have been warning him he will be blamed for job losses, market losses and other economic damage from a prolonged trade war with China.
On Tuesday, Kudlow deflected questions about the depressing effect of trade tensions on the markets. He argued that the tariffs affected only a fraction of the US economy, which is still showing robust growth in jobs and incomes. And he said the negative effect had been much greater in China.
“I’m not suggesting that there aren’t winners and losers in that game,” Kudlow said. “But on the other hand, I think we are in far better shape to weather this than the Chinese are.”
In China, where growth is slowing and the stock market has swooned, the government is mulling a broad cut in import tariffs that would lower trade barriers for companies around the world, including those in the United States, people briefed on Beijing’s thinking said.
But the US demands could be a major sticking point. Chinese leaders are reluctant to accept any permanent American tariffs on Chinese goods, fearing that such a compromise would be seen at home as a sign of weakness.
Until now, the two sides have been mostly talking past each other.