President Donald Trump on Wednesday said he was very happy with a trade deal that restored a fragile truce in the U.S.-China trade war, a day after negotiators from Washington and Beijing agreed on a framework covering tariff rates.
The deal also removes Chinese export restrictions on rare earth minerals and allows Chinese students access to U.S. universities.
“We made a great deal with China. We’re very happy with it,” Trump told reporters before a performance at Washington’s Kennedy Center on Wednesday evening. “We have everything we need, and we’re going to do very well with it. And hopefully they are too.”
Earlier, Trump used his social media platform to offer some of the first details to emerge from two days of marathon talks in London that had, in the words of U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, put “meat on the bones” of an agreement reached last month in Geneva to ease bilateral retaliatory tariffs that had reached crushing triple-digit levels.
“Our deal with China is done, subject to final approval with President Xi and me,” Trump said on Truth Social. “Full magnets, and any necessary rare earths, will be supplied, up front, by China. Likewise, we will provide to China what was agreed to, including Chinese students using our colleges and universities (which has always been good with me!). We are getting a total of 55% tariffs, China is getting 10%.”
A White House official said the 55% represents the sum of a baseline 10% “reciprocal” tariff Trump has imposed on goods imported from nearly all U.S. trading partners; 20% on all Chinese imports because of punitive measures Trump has imposed on China, Mexico and Canada, associated with his accusation that the three facilitate the flow of the opioid fentanyl into the U.S.; and pre-existing 25% levies on imports from China that were put in place during Trump’s first term in the White House.
Lutnick said the 55% rate on Chinese imports is fixed and unalterable. Asked on Wednesday on CNBC if the tariff levels on China would not change, he said: “You can definitely say that.”
Still, many specifics of the deal and details on how it will be implemented remain unclear.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told lawmakers that the deal would not reduce U.S. export restrictions on high-end artificial intelligence chips in return for access to Chinese rare earths.
“There is no quid pro quo in terms of chips for rare earths,” Bessent told a U.S. Senate Appropriations subcommittee hearing.
China’s commerce ministry did not immediately reply to a request for comment and more information.
Reuters
