Trump threatens to reignite trade war

Speaking to reporters in a healthcare briefing, published on the White House website on 30 April, Mr Trump indicated trade relations between the US and China have been damaged. His comments follow a preliminary ‘Phase One Deal’ negotiated between the two countries in December 2019 to halt a new set of US tariffs on Chinese imports.

“So recently, we signed a trade deal with China, a number of months ago. China is buying billions of dollars’ worth of our product, our farm product and other product, manufacturing product, and it’s been a great deal,” said Mr Trump. “But then, we noticed a virus. And it’s not acceptable what happened. It came out of China, and it’s not acceptable what happened.”

December’s trade deal was anticipated to prevent further economic strain on US west coast ports, which have been adversely affected since the trade war began in 2018. The ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach both experienced a drop in container volumes during the trade war.

Mr Trump suggested the conclusion of investigations into how COVID-19 spread will have a significant impact on future trade deals.

“You’ve heard three or four different concepts as to how it came out. We should have the answer to that in the not-too-distant future, and that will determine a lot how I feel about China,” he said.

Negotiations on the ‘Phase Two Deal’ were due to begin immediately, Mr Trump said in December.