President Trump said Monday that he’ll hold face-to-face talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping at the G-20 summit in Japan in late June. The meeting comes despite a ratcheting up of tariffs by both sides following a near-breakdown in trade talks last week. The summit is set for June 28-29.
“I’ll be meeting with President Xi of China,” Trump told reporters at the White House Monday, adding he thought a deal was still possible. “I think China wants to have it.”
Trump said the deal had been mostly finished when it began to unravel over a week ago. “We had a deal with China. It was 95% there, and then my representatives, Secretary [Steven] Mnuchin and [U.S. Trade Representative] Bob Lighthizer went to China, and they were told the things that were fully agreed to were not agreed to,” he said. “I said, ‘Fine. Put on the tariffs.'”
On Friday, the administration moved to raise existing tariffs on $250 billion worth of goods to 25%, up from 10% in most cases. The White House has also said it would place 25% levies on a further $300 billion worth of goods, effectively covering all Chinese imports. “I haven’t made that decision yet,” Trump said regarding the additional tariffs.
Beijing said Monday that it would hike tariffs on $60 billion in U.S. goods to as high as 25%.
To protect U.S. farmers from retaliation by China, Trump said, the government would provide aid based on the biggest recent year of Chinese purchases of farm product, which would be about $15 billion. “Our farmers are going to be very well taken care of,” he said.
