Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Trump defends push to help ZTE in trade talks with China
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump said there has been “no folding” in his trade negotiations with China, as he defended his efforts to help a Chinese telecommunications company that violated U.S. sanctions.
Trump tweeted Wednesday, “Nothing has happened with ZTE except as it pertains to the larger trade deal.” He added that, “We have not seen China’s demands yet.”
The White House said that Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin will lead talks Thursday and Friday with Chinese Vice Premier Liu He aimed at heading off a trade war between the world’s two biggest economies. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, U.S. Trade Rep. Robert Lighthizer, White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow and trade advisers Peter Navarro and Everett Eissenstat will also participate.
The Trump administration has proposed tariffs on up to $150 billion in Chinese products to punish Beijing for forcing American companies to turn over technology in exchange for access to the Chinese market. China has counterpunched by targeting $50 billion in U.S. products.
Trump tweeted his support for ZTE this week, putting the president not only at odds with the Commerce Department and its decision to impose trade restrictions on the company amid allegations it violated U.S. sanctions, but with his own past comments in which he routinely accused Chinese technology companies of stealing American jobs and intellectual property.
Trump has drawn criticism from Democrats and Republicans that the company poses a national security risk.
Sen. Marco Rubio, RFla., questioned how the U.S. would be able to enforce the “cancellation” of the Iran deal “if we are not going to be enforcing it on companies in powerful countries that are helping Iran evade sanctions already.”
Rubio said the Chinese telecom companies are “agents of the Chinese government. And they don’t just steal national security secrets, they steal commercial secrets.”
A giant with some 80,000 employees in 160 countries, ZTE sold 44 million smartphones globally last year, about half of them to U.S. consumers.
Trump is not only at loggerheads with intelligence agency chiefs over the threat that ZTE may pose to U.S. national security, he’s also seeking to reverse his own Commerce Department, which last month barred U.S. companies from selling components and software to ZTE for seven years after finding that the firm breached U.S. sanctions on Iran.
Attention over the Trump’s reversal regarding ZTE comes amid reports that a Chinese government-owned company has signed on to build a theme park in Indonesia that also features a Trump Orginization hotel and condos, a deal that stands to benefit the president’s company.
Even though Trump’s involvement in the project predated his election, ethics experts say it’s still trouble for the president, possibly putting him in violation of the emoluments clause of the Constitution, which bans gifts from foreign governments.