The White House asserted Friday that it has the upper hand in its economic fight with China, arguing that the country’s economy is “crumbling” due to the trade barrier the administration had erected against it. The comments came in response to China’s latest move to escalate the trade fight between the two countries by promising to slap tariffs of between 5-25 percent on $60 billion worth of U.S goods.

White House Economic adviser Larry Kudlow said China’s announcement “was a much lower number than we had been looking at” and therefore not really a “tit-for-tat response,” given that the White House had proposed larger tariffs. The reason China’s retaliation threat was not stronger was that the Chinese economy was suffering, he argued.