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Exclusive: Dozens of Republican former U.S. national security officials to back Biden
U.S. officials, including Lighthizer and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Treasury Steven Mnuchin, have recently affirmed China’s commitment to meet terms of the Phase 1 trade deal, which calls for China to boost purchases of U.S. farm and manufactured goods, energy and services by $200 billion over two years.
Pompeo, asked by syndicated radio show host Hugh Hewitt about prospects for a new cold war, said on Tuesday the U.S. economy was far more integrated with China’s than with the former Soviet Union.
“We have to think about this in a way that reflects that, because the challenges of American economic growth and prosperity are deeply intertwined today with the Chinese economy,” Pompeo said, adding that Trump was determined to protect U.S. interests.
Mnuchin, asked about decoupling in a Bloomberg-Invesco forum, said it would occur if U.S. companies were not allowed to compete fairly in the China’s economy.
A person familiar with both U.S. and Chinese thinking on the trade deal said Navarro’s comments appeared to be a “slip of the tongue,” reflecting his personal hawkish views on China and not administration policy.
The person also said Chinese officials have indicated that June imports from the United States were expected to show a dramatic increase after falls in recent months due to the outbreak.
STRONG INVESTMENT
U.S. companies had announced $2.3 billion in new direct investment projects in the first quarter of 2020, only slightly down from last year's quarterly average despite the coronavirus, the Rhodium Group said in a recent study here - indicating that few U.S. companies are reducing their China footprint.
Bill Reinsch, a senior adviser and trade expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said it took over 20 years for the U.S. and Chinese economies to grow together, and decoupling cannot be accomplished easily.
Some companies are leaving, not because of Trump, but because of rising Chinese wage rates and Chinese policies that have disadvantaged foreign-owned businesses, he said.
“If you’re in China to serve the Chinese market, you’re going to stay because you can’t serve it as well from the outside,” Reinsch said. “The president can’t simply order everybody to come home. Businesses will make rational, economic decisions.”
Reporting by David Lawder; Editing by Heather Timmons, Jonathan Oatis and Tom Brown
Our Standards:The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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