(WASHINGTON D.C.) — House-Senate legislation would end Permanent Normal Trade Relations, or PNTR, with China and sharply boost tariffs on Chinese goods, risking a new trade war feared by US agriculture, industry and consumers.
The GOP bill’s sponsors say “nothing is normal” about US trade relations with China and their measure would end a 20-year-old “policy mistake” that’s failed to make China freer and US firms richer. House CCP Select Committee Chair John Moolenaar (R-MI) and senators including Secretary of State-designate Marco Rubio (R-FL) seek to decouple the US economy from China, a major ag trading partner.
Incoming Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) says “We’ll be looking at policies that we think make sense in terms of promoting US competitiveness globally, and if necessary, remedy some of the bad behavior of the Chinese.”
Senator Thune, hailing from the largely agricultural state of South Dakota, sits on the Senate Ag Committee and frequently argues for market-opening free trade agreements. But he also sees China as a threat. “One of the things that President Trump and his team, as they take office, are going to be talking about, is how China cheats on trade agreements,” says Senator Thune. And I think we have to be looking at the world today, in a very clear-eyed way through a lens that understands that there are lots of threats out there.”
Sponsors of the China PNTR-ending bill argue the Chinese Communist Party has stolen trillions worth of US intellectual property and with it, four million US jobs since 2000.
Story by Berns Bureau Washington/Matt Kaye; courtesy of NAFB News Service