Trump’s Economic Security Tools Need Clear Plan, Goals to Succeed, Former Biden Official Says
A former top Commerce Department adviser in the Biden administration expects President Donald Trump and Congress to continue prioritizing export controls and other trade restrictions, although he said the government’s success partly depends on whether the administration can craft a clear, coordinated economic security strategy that doesn’t only rely on tariffs.
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Navin Girishankar, who most recently served as counselor to former Commerce Deputy Secretary Don Graves, said he expects new export controls, sanctions and tariffs all to be “on the table” during the second Trump administration. He said that’s partly because there has been consistent, bipartisan focus among multiple administrations and sessions of Congress to use trade controls, especially “on the need to strengthen our capability to enforce export controls” around sensitive technologies.
“The export control agenda to maintain an advantage and to prevent the seepage of dual-use technologies to China, where there’s civil-military fusion, has broad consensus,” Girishankar said during an event last week hosted by the Korea Society. “Just look on the Hill, look in the administration. You'll see the signals.”
He noted that the U.S. is “in the midst of an accelerating technology competition” with China, and the U.S. should specifically be focusing its export control work on artificial intelligence, quantum technologies, clean technologies and biotechnologies.
But Girishankar, who is now the president of the Economic Security and Technology Department at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, also warned that the U.S. needs to have a clear plan before imposing new trade measures on China or other major trading partners. He also questioned whether the Trump administration will tap a new agency or official to oversee its economic security policy tools -- including through the creation of an “economic security czar.”
“All these things may be part of the DOGE agenda,” said Girishankar, referring to the new Department of Government Efficiency, which is tasked with slashing federal spending.
“The challenge is going to be, how do you work these [tools] together with some sort of strategic coordination that delivers impact?” he said. “And what’s the goal?”
Although Girishankar said Trump’s economic security plan appears to be similar to the strategy used by the Biden administration, he stressed that there’s a “delta” between the two governments’ strategies on tariffs, which could have trickle-down impacts on other tools.
“We know they're coming,” Girishankar said of tariffs. “Are they going to be strategic? Will they be across the board,” or “will they sequence them with China first and then neighbors and allies like Mexico and Canada?” He added that the order of the tariffs matters “because it affects then what kind of deals the U.S. can strike and how do partners as well as competitors respond.”
Yeo Han-koo, South Korea’s former trade minister and now a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, said countries hit with tariffs, specifically in Asia, could decide to “join forces and push back and retaliate” against the U.S. That could include trade restrictions.
But he said it’s “more likely” that countries race to strike an agreement with Trump to avoid possible tariffs, which could include those countries offering trade concessions. He said most nations don’t have the “bargaining power” of China or the EU and don’t want to risk escalating trade tensions with a Trump-led government.
“Overall, I think this causes an uncertain trading environment,” he said, “and it may have a negative impact on export-oriented trading regions that many of these Asian countries belong to.”
Girishankar said he’s concerned about how a range of new tariffs could impact the United States’ standing in global supply chains. “The challenge is, can the U.S. continue to be integrated into value chains … particularly around advanced technologies, while imposing a tariff policy?” he said. “So let’s see how it happens.”