President Trump’s designation of China as a currency manipulator has drawn virtually no reaction from members of Congress, even though a number of lawmakers have pressed for years such a move.
The decision, announced Monday by the Treasury Department, represents an escalation in the ongoing trade war with China but is largely passing without comment.
The silence is a consequence of the odd politics of the issue, said Michael Stumo, president of the Coalition for a Prosperous America, a business and labor coalition group that has applauded the Treasury Department’s announcement. Calling out China’s actions to control its currency has always been more popular with Democrats, he noted, who aren’t eager to praise Trump. “Democrats are loathe to praise Trump and Republicans mostly haven’t been with him on the issue,” Stumo told the Washington Examiner.
Trump ran in 2016 on the issue of labeling China as a currency manipulator, promising that it would be one of his first acts upon taking office. Until Monday, however, the Treasury Department under the Trump administration continued to find that China did not meet the definition of a currency manipulator.
As recently as May, it declined to put the label on Beijing, despite stating that it had “significant concerns” about China’s currency practices. Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer of New York slammed Trump at the time, arguing he was letting Beijing off the hook. “This is the fifth time in a row that the Trump administration has refused to label China a currency manipulator,” he said. Since Monday, Schumer’s office has released no statement on the administration’s reversal. It did not respond to repeated inquiries from the Washington Examiner on the subject.
Pennsylvania Sen. Bob Casey, a Democrat who has urged Trump to label China a manipulator, has not commented on the designation. Nor has Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown, another Democrat who has also called for China to be labeled a manipulator.
The silence is bipartisan. The Treasury Department’s announcement has drawn virtually no reaction from top congressional leaders either. A spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, said they had no statement and no plans to make one. A spokeswoman for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat, a critic of Beijing who has repeatedly highlighted China’s human rights record, did not respond to multiple requests for comment. Senate Finance Chairman Chuck Grassley, an Iowa Republican whose committee has jurisdiction on the issue, did not respond to a request for comment. Nor did the committee’s top Democrat, Oregon’s Ron Wyden.
A search of a congressional database by Propublica.com, the nonprofit news organization, could find no official comment by any lawmaker of either party on the announcement.
