Fred Dufour | AFP | Getty Images
Chinese President Xi Jinping and U.S. President Donald Trump attend a welcome ceremony at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on Nov. 9, 2017.
President Donald Trump on Friday said that he has asked China to “immediately remove all tariffs” on American agricultural products, in return for his decision to postpone a March 1 deadline that would have dramatically raised U.S. tariffs on Chinese imports.
Trump made the request “based on the fact that we are moving along nicely with trade discussions,” he said. The president called in particular for Beijing to lift its levies on products such as beef and pork.
On Sunday, Trump announced that he would delay the additional tariffs that were scheduled to go into effect at the beginning of March and would have more than doubled levies from 10 percent to 25 percent on $200 billion in Chinese goods. The president has not announced a new deadline for that round of tariffs.
Trump also said Sunday that if more progress is made toward a resolution of the long-running trade negotiations between the two countries, Chinese President Xi Jinping would be invited to a summit at Trump’s Florida golf course, Mar-a-Lago, to “conclude an agreement.”
Trump’s top economic advisor, Larry Kudlow, painted a rosy picture of the ongoing trade negotiations in an interview with CNBC on Thursday.
“The progress has been terrific,” Kudlow said, while adding that “we have to hear from the Chinese side. We have to hear from President Xi Jinping, of course. I think we’re headed for a remarkable, historic deal.”
A day before Kudlow’s interview, U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer gave a more cautious outlook in testimony before Congress.
“Much still needs to be done both before an agreement is reached,” Lighthizer testified, “and, more importantly, after it is reached, if one is reached.”
Trump’s request could also suggest he recognizes the impact of the U.S.-China trade war has taken on American farmers. Growing tariffs have led to China scaling back purchases of U.S. grain, and have affected the storage, shipping and freight operations that American farmers need to move their crops to market.
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