Trump Accuses China of Breaking Trade Deal, Warns of Retaliation
U.S. President Donald Trump said on Thursday that China had “completely” violated the recent preliminary trade understanding between the two countries and warned that he would respond. His remarks came after Washington and Beijing agreed on May 12 to a 90-day tariff rollback, under which U.S. retaliatory duties on Chinese goods fell from 125% to 10%, while a separate 20% tariff linked by Trump to China’s role in fentanyl smuggling into the United States remained in place. China, for its part, cut retaliatory tariffs on U.S. imports to 10% from 125%.
In a post on his Truth Social platform, Trump said China had been in “serious economic danger” two weeks earlier because his high tariffs had made it impossible for Chinese goods to sell in the U.S., which he called the world’s largest market by far. He said factories had shut down and there was, “to put it mildly, ‘civil unrest.’” Trump added that he struck a quick deal to save China from what he viewed as a very bad situation, saying the arrangement stabilized things and brought China back to “business as usual.”
“The good news,” he wrote, is that everyone was happy after the deal. “The bad news is that China, to nobody’s surprise, completely violated the agreement with the United States. I’m done being Mr. Nice Guy,” he said.
U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer told CNBC that Washington was “very concerned” about China’s apparent noncompliance with the temporary deal. He said the United States had done exactly what it was supposed to do, while China was moving slowly, which he called unacceptable and something that must be addressed.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told Fox News on Wednesday that trade talks with China were “a little stalled” and that direct talks between the two leaders would be needed. He said he expected more talks in the coming weeks and that a Trump-Xi conversation could happen “at some point.” Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping last spoke in January, shortly before Trump’s inauguration.
