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After suggesting last week that the U.S. government would seek to rejoin the sovereignty-shredding Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), President Donald Trump took to social media on April 18 to slam the controversial “free trade” regime that he once described as the “rape of our country.” Instead, Trump is seeking a bilateral agreement with remaining Pacific-rim governments such as Japan. Grassroots conservatives celebrated the announcement. But establishment voices were less than happy about it. Writing after a meeting at his Mar-a-Lago estate with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Trump suggested he was still opposed to TPP and preferred a bilateral trade deal...

Everything I have learned as a capitalist and a Republican is that tariffs are counterproductive. They are hidden taxes that raise the price of the goods we buy and harm trade with other countries, which is not good for America or for our trading partner. If that is so, then provide us with another path to solving the China trading problem. President Trump probably made a mistake with going after steel and aluminum importers as a class. Certainly he has a point that we must maintain our own production capabilities in those areas, but just because our industries are suffering...

When JoJo McKibben was the victim of a hit-and-run on April 3 as she biked to work, she wasn't all that surprised. She was hit while biking by a drunk driver last summer and has come to expect that cars won't realize she's riding on two wheels. McKibben's boyfriend Brendan Sharpe said he has also been seriously injured by cars while he's biked in Austin, once in 2009 and again in 2015... Katie Delleoz, the executive director of Bike Austin, said she personally has nearly been struck at the same intersection McKibben was hit at last week

Chinese President Xi Jinping promised on Tuesday to open the country’s economy further and lower import tariffs on products like cars, in a speech seen as an attempt to defuse an escalating trade dispute with the United States. While much of his pledges were reiterations of previously announced reforms that foreign businesses say are long overdue, Xi’s comments sent stock markets and the U.S. dollar higher on hopes of a compromise that could avert a trade war. Xi said China will widen market access for foreign investors, addressing a chief complaint of its trading partners and a point of contention...

It was a black Monday for Russian oligarchs as up to $16 billion was wiped off the value of the country's wealthiest tycoons' holdings in the wake of U.S.-imposed sanctions. The ruble fell to its lowest level against the dollar since late 2016, while shares in sanctioned aluminum producer Rusal, which is controlled by the billionaire Oleg Deripaska, plunged more than 50 percent on the Hong Kong stock exchange. As Russian stocks tumbled, the Kremlin reportedly said it would step in to support affected companies. The latest sanctions were announced by President Donald Trump on Friday. They target leading figures...

China has filed a World Trade Organization complaint challenging U.S. President Donald Trump's tariff hike on imported steel and aluminum, the trade body said Tuesday. The tariff spat is one element of a wide-ranging trade dispute between Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping's government. Trump also has threatened to increase duties on $50 billion of Chinese goods in a separate conflict over technology policy. (please see link, for full article)

Ok. It took exactly ONE DAY. China just filed a lawsuit, against America.

US policy towards China has been misdirected for decades and policymakers are now recalibrating ties, Senator Elizabeth Warren told reporters during a visit to Beijing amid heightened trade tensions between the world's two largest economies. The Massachusetts Democrat and Trump foe, who has been touted as a potential 2020 presidential candidate despite rejecting such speculation, has said US trade policy needs a rethink and that she is not afraid of tariffs. Misdirected policy After years of mistakenly assuming economic engagement would lead to a more open China, the US government was waking up to Chinese demands for US companies to...

Beijing is still talking about a trade war with the U.S., warning that President Donald Trump’s proposed trade penalties could lead to conflict. "We hope the United States can rein in its horse before the edge of the cliff, or else we will fight to the end," Chinese Ministry of Commerce spokesman Gao Feng said Thursday, reiterating a point recently made by the Chinese Embassy in the U.S. (please see the full article, at the link)

The Chinese government plans to immediately impose tariffs on 128 U.S. products, including pork and certain fruits, a direct response to President Trump’s recent moves to pursue numerous trade restrictions against Beijing. If U.S. goods become more expensive in China, Chinese buyers could opt to purchase products from Europe, South America or elsewhere, though White House officials have routinely discounted the likelihood of this. Beijing’s move could force Trump to decide whether to follow through on expansive trade restrictions he had hoped would crack down on China even if Beijing is now threatening to harm U.S. companies that rely on...

China will open up its economy further, and its door to the outside will only get wider, with foreign and domestic firms allowed to compete on an equal footing, Premier Li Keqiang said at the close the country's annual parliament session on Tuesday. The familiar-sounding pledges from Beijing came as the prospect of a global trade war loomed in the wake of U.S. President Donald Trump imposition of hefty import tariffs on steel and aluminum earlier this month. (please see link, for full article)

President Trump’s practice of staking out extreme positions on trade as a negotiating tactic is a sign of his brilliance. Or so we’re told. But that theory took on water last week, when Mr. Trump had to backtrack on a promise to hit Mexico and Canada with a 25% tariff on steel and a 10% tariff on aluminum, without any concessions from either Mexico City or Ottawa. To understand the change of heart, take the list of products slated for a new Trump tariff on steel and total the value of those same products exported by U.S. producers. You will...

More Americans overall disapprove than approve of President Donald Trump's import tariffs on steel and aluminum, but Republicans back the president, and they believe the U.S. would come out ahead if a trade war were to ensue. A majority of Democrats and a plurality of independents disapprove of the new tariff measures, while two-thirds of Republicans approve.

President Donald Trump’s new tariffs on imported steel and aluminum look like an effort that goes beyond its stated rationale of preserving national security. The tariffs could be the first of a number of initiatives by the Trump administration to retaliate against unfair foreign trade practices. “We’re going to see who’s treating us fairly, who’s not treating us fairly,” Trump said at the White House on March 8 while rolling out the new trade barriers. Trump signed orders imposing a 25 percent tariff on imported steel and a 10 percent tariff on imported aluminum. However, he has kept the doors...

Rick Davis, the manager of Senator John McCain’s presidential campaign, is a typical Washington insider in many ways, having long worked as both a lobbyist and a political operative along the intersection of politics, policy and money. Now Mr. Davis is overseeing new lobbyist-related guidelines that the campaign has issued in an effort to safeguard Mr. McCain’s reputation as an opponent of special interests. The plan, among other things, bars “registered” lobbyists, those who must file disclosure reports listing their clients, from working on the campaign. Mr. Davis, who last worked as a registered lobbyist in 2005 and took a...

I’m the guy who predicted a Trump victory against all odds in the 2016 election. I also predicted a “Trump Miracle” for the economy. Here’s my new prediction: President Trump guaranteed his re-election last week. Liberals must be sick to their stomachs. No matter what they do or say, no matter how hard they try to distract us from the booming economy, the “Trump Miracle” shines through. I was going to write about the Trump administration’s war with California, illegal immigration and liberal politicians serving as “lookouts” for illegal felons. This move is cheered by middle-class Americans sick of being...

When President Trump announced he was slapping a 25 percent tariff on imported steel and a 10 percent toll on foreign aluminum, a friend asked me how the president could possibly possess such unilateral authority under our governmental system of checks and balances. That was my first thought, too, before surmising that our über-experienced Congress had again simply handed away its constitutional power, as is its habit, thoughtlessly — like motel matches. Writing in National Review, Jay Cost confirmed my suspicion: “Over the past 80 years, authority over tariffs, as well as over all manner of properly legislative functions,...

French President Emmanuel Macron on Friday warned his US counterpart Donald Trump against forging ahead with planned tariffs on European steel and aluminium, saying it risked starting a mutually destructive “trade war”. In a telephone call with Trump, the French leader expressed his “deep concerns”, saying the tariffs due to come into effect in two weeks “risk triggering a trade war, in which all affected countries would be losers”, Macron’s office said. He also argued that “such measures against allied countries, who respect international trade rules, would not be effective in fighting unfair practices”, and said the European Union would...

Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) said on Thursday that he will introduce legislation to nix President Trump's tariffs on steel and aluminum imports just minutes after they were announced. "I will immediately draft and introduce legislation to nullify these tariffs, and I urge my colleagues to pass it before this exercise in protectionism inflicts any more damage on the economy," Flake said in a statement. Trump announced that he would levy the penalties — a 25 percent tariff for steel and 10 percent on aluminum — during a White House event. Canada and Mexico are exempted amid larger trade negotiations, Trump...

Former CIA chief John Brennan made a rare appearance on Twitter Wednesday to lash out at President Donald Trump over “ignorance” that threatens U.S. prosperity. The commander in chief’s recent talk of possible steel and aluminum tariffs prompted a social-media jab by Mr. Brennan this week. The post — 1 of 18 total tweets, with the vast majority related to Mr. Trump or the U.S. Russia probe — questioned the president’s economic acumen. “You show an amazing albeit unsurprising ignorance of how technology, automation, and the attendant evolution of economics and societies have transformed the world,” Mr. Brennan, who served...