President Donald Trump has warned that US tariffs on $250 billion of Chinese exports are unlikely to go away anytime soon — even if the two countries reach a deal to end their trade war.
“We’re not talking about removing them, we’re talking about leaving them for a substantial period of time,” Trump said Wednesday. “Because we have to make sure that if we do the deal with China that China lives by the deal because they’ve had a lot of problems living by certain deals.”
The United States and China, the world’s two biggest economies, are trying to negotiate a resolution to their trade dispute that escalated dramatically last year with both sides imposing new tariffs on huge portions of each other’s exports.
The clash has shaken financial markets, fueled political tensions and caused problems for companies around the world. Businesses have already begun shifting their supply chains out of China to other countries in Asia to avoid the trade-war tariffs.
Trade talks between the two governments will resume next week after a pause in negotiations, a Trump administration official told CNN this week.
US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer will travel to Beijing for discussions meant to finalize an agreement between the two countries. It’s expected that a Chinese delegation, led by Vice Premier Liu He, would then go to Washington for further talks.
Negotiations had been on hold as the two sides tried to figure out how to overcome disagreements about how the United States would ensure China is abiding by any deal. US concerns about how China goes about getting hold of American technology and trade secrets have also been a sticking point.