大意， 痛骂财政部长。
可惜， 骂错人了。
财政部长最后说， 我人格稳定。
The trade war between the United States and China showed nosigns of yielding on Thursday, as Steven Mnuchin, the Treasury secretary,told lawmakers there was no clear path to resolution and Beijing blasted theadministration over its approach.
Mr. Mnuchin, who has tried to avoid calling the trade tensions with China a“war,” said talks with Beijing had “broken down” and suggested it wasnow up to China to come to the table with concessions. President Trump,speaking in Brussels on Thursday, described the trade talks with China as a“nasty” battle.
The Chinese, meanwhile, accused the United States of “acting erratically”and said the administration had “blatantly abandoned the consensuses thattwo sides have reached and insisted on fighting a trade war with China.”Republicans and Democrats on the House Financial Services Committee showedlittle patience for Mr. Mnuchin’s answers about the lack of progress,repeatedly pressing him about whether there was a strategy to resolve thetrade war and expressing concern that it was starting to hurt parts of theeconomy.
The White House has already hit Beijing with tariffs on $34 billion worth ofimports and China has responded with a similar amount of levies on Americangoods, including soybeans, pork and cars. On Tuesday, the administrationoutlined tariffs on another $200 billion worth of Chinese products,including many consumer products like furniture, dog leashes and fish.
“Is there a master plan?” asked Representative Mia Love, Republican ofUtah. “I implore you to work to end this thing soon.”Lawmakers from both parties have been bombarded with complaints abouttariffs from soybean farmers, carmakers, nail manufacturers and otherbusinesses about the fate of their industries as they are starting to facehigher steel and aluminum costs and feel the pain of retaliation from Europeand China.
On Thursday they pressed Mr. Mnuchin, who is seen as a voice of moderationon trade in the administration, to persuade Mr. Trump to back away from thetrade war.
Representative Jeb Hensarling, Republican of Texas and chairman of thecommittee, told Mr. Mnuchin that he was deeply concerned about the state ofglobal trade and signs that business optimism was starting to wane. He saidthat he was not impressed with the lone trade deal that Mr. Trump has struck, with South Korea, and warned that the strong run of economic growth was atrisk.
“I would just assure you we very much are monitoring the impact on theeconomy of all these trade issues,” Mr. Mnuchin said in response toquestions about the economic effect.
Mr. Mnuchin defended the administration’s approach and insisted thateconomic growth remained Mr. Trump’s priority, which did nothing to mollifyMr. Hensarling, a close ally of the president.
“I appreciate the words; I am concerned about the deeds,” he said.
Republicans and Democrats on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee alsorepeatedly — and exasperatedly — pushed another Trump administrationofficial to detail a strategy for prevailing in the trade dispute during ahearing on Thursday morning.
“The administration needs to explain to Congress where this is all headed,” Senator Bob Corker, Republican of Tennessee and the committee’s chairman, told Manisha Singh, an assistant secretary at the State Department, as sheprepared to testify.
“To my knowledge, not a single person is able to articulate where this isheaded, nor what the plans are, nor what the strategy is,” Mr. Corker said.
The committee’s top Democrat, Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey, toldMs. Singh at another point that “I don’t understand what the pathway ishere, at the end of the day.”Ms. Singh, who leads the department’s Bureau of Economic and BusinessAffairs, defended the administration’s moves. “Our endgame is for China tochange its behavior,” she said.
After Ms. Singh tried to explain the administration’s approach, Mr. Corkerreplied, “That enlightened us in no way.”While Mr. Trump prizes unpredictability, his approach to trade agreements issowing uncertainty that many business leaders, officials, lawmakers andothers worry could undercut an otherwise booming economy.
In an interview with the radio program “Marketplace” on Thursday, theFederal Reserve chairman, Jerome H. Powell, said that “we don’t know” howthe trade dispute will play out, but that it could harm the recovery.
“I wouldn’t want to, you know, dive into a bunch of hypotheticals here,”Mr. Powell said, “but I would say, you can imagine situations which wouldbe very challenging, where inflation is going up and the economy isweakening.”The Trump administration has asked China to make a wide array of changes,including reducing its trade surplus with the United States, stopping whatit described as theft of American intellectual property and opening Chinesemarkets to American business.
But by giving the Chinese a long list of demands, that has encouragedBeijing to focus on those that are easiest to fulfill, said Jeremie Waterman, president of the China Center at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
“The administration, to a degree, has given the Chinese an off ramp,” hesaid. “Giving the Chinese a choice is not an optimal negotiating approach.”China has also had difficulty figuring out whom to negotiate with, aftertentative agreements reached with Mr. Mnuchin and Wilbur Ross, the commercesecretary, fell through.
“I think they’re coming to the conclusion that it doesn’t matter whetherMnuchin or Ross or anybody is in the front of the line, that it’s reallygoing to be figuring out what Trump wants,” said Claire Reade, seniorcounsel at Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer.
In a sign of the impasse that the dialogue between China and the UnitedStates has reached, the Chinese Ministry of Commerce issued a statement onThursday arguing that it has been unfairly vilified with false claims aboutits trade practices.
“This is a distortion of facts, therefore groundless,” the ministry said.
“For the purpose of meeting domestic political needs and suppressing China’s development, the U.S. has fabricated a set of policy arguments thatdistort the truth about Sino-U.S. economic and trade relations.”Mr. Mnuchin said on Thursday that Mr. Trump would not do anything tojeopardize economic growth. He insisted that he was going to help work withcompanies to get exemptions from tariffs and that he would try to persuadebusinesses such as Harley-Davidson, the motorcycle maker, not to movemanufacturing abroad to mitigate the pain of retaliatory tariffs.
While Mr. Mnuchin was successful in staving off draconian new Chineseinvestment restrictions, the tariffs have kept coming and it remains unclearhow much influence he really has with Mr. Trump. Despite his privatereservations, Mr. Mnuchin continues to defend the administration’s tradepolicies.
“I can assure you that the president listens to my advice,” Mr. Mnuchinsaid in response to a question from Representative Gregory W. Meeks,Democrat of New York. “He is the president. Sometimes he follows my advice,and sometimes he doesn’t, which I respect.”Unimpressed, Mr. Meeks mocked Mr. Trump for describing himself for thesecond time on Thursday as a “very stable genius” and asked the Treasurysecretary if he saw himself the same way.
“I am stable,” Mr. Mnuchin said with a chuckle.
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