The President's Daily Brief
April 17th, 2025: China Finally Blinks In Tariff War & Gaza Talks Collapse Again
17 Apr 2025
In this episode of The President's Daily Brief: China signals a possible retreat in the trade war, saying it’s open to talks—but only if President Trump shows some “respect.” Hamas rejects Israel’s latest ceasefire proposal, which included a pause in fighting and negotiations to disarm Gaza militants. The U.S. and Iran are set to resume nuclear talks in Rome, but Tehran says uranium enrichment is off the table. And in today’s Back of the Brief: A Pentagon shakeup—two senior Defense Department officials, including a top adviser to Pete Hegseth, have been placed on leave as part of a leak investigation. To listen to the show ad-free, become a premium member of The President’s Daily Brief by visiting PDBPremium.com. Please remember to subscribe if you enjoyed this episode of The President's Daily Brief. YouTube: youtube.com/@presidentsdailybrief TriTails Premium Beef: Visit https://TryBeef.com/PDB for 2 free Flat Iron steaks with your first box over $250 Birch Gold: Text PDB to 989898 and get your free info kit on gold Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Full Episode
My name is Mike Slater. I have a podcast called Politics by Faith. I was just talking to a friend of mine who said he hasn't been able to follow the news lately. It's been too much. It's too crazy. It's driving him crazy. And he's just checked out. If you feel that way sometimes too, I think you'll really like our podcast, Politics by Faith.
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It's Thursday, the 17th of April. Welcome to the President's Daily Brief. I'm Mike Baker, your eyes and ears on the world stage. Let's get briefed. We'll start things off with another update on the heated trade conflict between the U.S. and China. After days of back-and-forth retaliations and recriminations, Beijing now says it's open to talks, but only if President Trump shows some respect.
Later in the show, Hamas has rejected Israel's latest ceasefire offer. Ooh, look, I'm currently wearing my not-surprised face. The proposal called for a pause in fighting, the release of more hostages, and even talks on disarming Gaza militants. But Hamas isn't budging.
And in part, they're not budging because, well, frankly, they really don't care how many Gaza residents have died as a result of Hamas's 7 October 2023 attacks and Israel's subsequent response. Plus, the latest on negotiations between the U.S. and Iran. Iran's foreign minister says uranium enrichment is non-negotiable just days before talks resume in Rome.
Washington, meanwhile, insists that the program can't continue as is. And in today's back of the brief, a shakeup at the Pentagon. Three senior Defense Department officials, including a top advisor to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, have been placed on leave as part of a leak investigation. But first, today's PDB Spotlight.
China appears to have made overtures to the Trump White House in the ongoing trade war with the U.S. After weeks of tit-for-tat retaliatory trade measures, ooh, say that three times fast, Beijing is now signaling it may be open to negotiations, but only on its terms. According to Bloomberg, Chinese officials are laying out several conditions before they'll come to the table.
Among the top demands, more, quote, respect from President Trump and his team. That reportedly includes dialing back disparaging comments from U.S. cabinet members and maintaining a more consistent negotiating posture. More specifically, it would probably require an apology from Vice President J.D. Vance, who last week said that America was borrowing money from, quote, Chinese peasants.
Apparently, and this is not a surprise, the Chinese Communist Party, the CCP, didn't take too kindly to that comment. China also wants the White House to address concerns around American sanctions in Taiwan. Specifically, Beijing is pushing for a rollback of targeted sanctions on Chinese firms and officials. On Taiwan, Chinese officials insist the U.S.
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