Dave Davies

You're right that Trump actually had considered retaliating with financial sanctions, new controls on, you know, sophisticated manufactured computer chips.

Could have been very strong measures, but he decided not to.

Yeah, you're right that historians may someday look back on this as the moment when China became America's geopolitical equal.

Now, you worked on China policy in the Biden administration.

And, you know, there are some analysts who are very critical of Donald Trump for many reasons who will say that he does deserve credit for identifying the lopsided arrangements with China, subsidizing its exports and engaging in unfair trade practices.

Do they have a point?

You know, just a day or two before his departure to Beijing, Trump announced a lengthy list of high-profile business executives he was going to take with him.

Elon Musk, Tim Cook of Apple, others.

What do you make of that?

You know, there was this recent court decision which declared Trump's tariffs to be illegally enacted.

There are still going to be appeals over that and he thinks he has ways around it.

Does that reduce his leverage with President Xi?

That's a tariff that's supposedly based upon national security emergencies?

And what do they want to sell to the U.S.

consumers?

The second China shock would be new industries in which Chinese imports displace American manufacturing.

Is that what you're talking about?

And so what China wants to do is to get manageable tariffs from the United States to put that into its calculations and market its vehicles and other goods to the United States?

Yes.

The United States wants China to buy more soybeans, Boeing planes, some other goods.