A limited trade deal announced between the U.S. and Taiwan (see 2305190074) angered the Chinese government. When asked about the deal at a regular press conference in Beijing, a Foreign Ministry spokesperson said that signing a deal with Taiwan "implies sovereignty." He added: "The U.S. move gravely violates the one-China principle and the three China-US joint communiqués, and contravenes the U.S.’s own commitment of maintaining only unofficial relations with Taiwan. China deplores and strongly opposes this move."
Members of Congress need to be mindful of what their proposals to regulate outbound investment might mean for U.S. businesses, one of the experts on a Washington International Trade Association webinar cautioned.
The leaders of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on the Indo-Pacific are trying to pass legislation to give the president the ability to respond to economic coercion of allies, but Chair Young Kim, R-Calif., asked witnesses at a subcommittee hearing she convened to advise what else could be done to stand up to China's economic aggression.
The U.S. and Taiwan completed five chapters of a trade agreement similar to the issues under discussion in the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework, the U.S. announced late May 18.
Both outbound and a new approach for the Committee for Foreign Investment in the U.S. drew attention at a recent hearing of the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, and the chairman of the committee suggested that limiting investment screening to active investors, such as venture capital firms, is not enough.
The chairman of the powerful House Rules Committee used his perch to promote a bill he sponsored that would allow the president to lower duties on non-import-sensitive goods made by a country that lost exports due to coercive actions; increase duties on imports from the "foreign adversary" committing the coercion; and allow the U.S. to more easily facilitate trade, including exports, with the coerced parties (see 2302230021).
Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., claiming that Ford Motor Company is clearly subservient to the Chinese Communist Party, wrote to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, asking them to "expeditiously implement" outbound investment screening so that they can "hold Ford accountable for cooperating with human traffickers and slavers in advancing the PRC’s geopolitical strategy, to the detriment of American economic development and national security."
Some supply chain agreements in the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework may be announced in May, according to officials at the Asia Society Policy Institute, and the institute held a webinar May 3 and released a paper with recommendations of how to shape the supply chain pillar ahead of those announcements.
The Senate will work over the next several months to build a bill Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., sees as a sequel to its China package -- also known as the Chips Act -- that could expand China-related export controls and investment restrictions.
Canadian Trade Minister Mary Ng said that Canada and its partners in NAFTA 2.0 will not be caught unawares when it's time for the sunset review in 2026. She said that she and her counterparts in Mexico and the U.S. will be taking stock of how the agreement is working in July.