By South China Morning Post | Created at 2025-01-24 22:36:35 | Updated at 2025-01-26 06:09:49
1 day ago
Five days into the new administration, the White House announced on Friday that it was conducting a “compliance review” of what it termed the “Economic and Trade Agreement” between China and the United States.
A statement by the Office of the US Trade Representative (USTR) said the intent was to determine if China is “acting in accordance with the commitments it made in the agreement”. It added that the review followed from President Donald Trump’s “America First Trade Policy”, one of scores of executive orders and memos signed on Monday immediately after his inauguration.
The two-paragraph, bare-bones release did not explicitly state whether this was a review of the phase one trade agreement signed by Trump in January 2020, during his first term. But Trump’s nominee for Treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, told the US Senate during confirmation hearings last week that the president would use this as a starting point in trade relations with Beijing.
In addition, Trump’s pick for US trade representative, Jamieson Greer, participated in all negotiations involving the phase one deal when he was USTR chief of staff.
Greer, a trade lawyer, was also closely involved in Trump’s original move to apply US$370 billion in tariffs on Chinese imports. In tapping him in November, Trump said Greer “played a key role during my first term in imposing tariffs on China and others to combat unfair trade practices”.
Analysts say using the deal as a starting point carries several advantages for the administration. Given that Beijing did not meet its terms, it puts China on the defensive and Washington in a position to extract concessions and reframe US-China negotiations. It could also serve to vindicate the approach and deal-making ability of the president, who prides himself on his negotiating skills
