President Trump said he was “not ready” to make a deal with China on trade and that a planned September meeting between White House officials and Beijing could be called off.
A cancellation would increase the likelihood that the Trump administration follows through with its threat to enact new tariffs on $300 billion on Chinese goods, since the levies are set to begin in September if a trade deal isn’t reached.
“We’re talking to China. We’re not ready to make a deal, but we’ll see what happens,” Trump told reporters Friday as he left the White House for a fundraising trip to New York. “We’ll see whether or not we keep our meeting in September. If we do, that’s fine. If we don’t, that’s fine.”
Trump announced last week that the administration would go ahead with new tariffs on $300 billion worth of Chinese goods, on top of existing tariffs of $250 billion worth of goods, following a meeting between U.S. and Chinese officials in which no progress was made. The move marked a sharp escalation in the ongoing trade war between the countries with China retaliation on Monday by suspending purchases of U.S. agricultural goods. The same day, the Treasury Department announced that it was designating China as a currency manipulator.
