President Donald Trump has pushed off imposing higher tariffs on China until November, just before additional tariffs were set to take effect Tuesday.
An executive order from the president was signed Monday that will prevent higher tariffs from going into effect against China for another three months – until Nov. 9.
The extension comes after Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent participated in trade negotiations in May with China in Geneva that resulted in a deal to temporarily ease up on strict tariffs imposed in April for 90 days.
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Specifically, the U.S. agreed it would cut down its tariffs against Chinese imports from 145% to 30%, and China agreed it would reduce its tariffs against U.S. imports from 125% to 10%.
But that temporary agreement would have expired Tuesday, meaning that the 145% tariffs originally imposed in April as part of Trump’s so-called “Liberation Day” would be reimposed again.
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Earlier Monday, Trump signaled he was undecided on whether he would kick back the deadline, but said that trade negotiations with China were progressing well.
“We’ll see what happens. We’ve been dealing very nicely with China…they have tremendous tariffs that they’re paying to the United States of America,” Trump told reporters. “We’ll see what happens. They’ve been dealing quite nicely. The relationship is very good with President Xi and myself.”
The two countries engaged in trade talks from Sweden at the end of July, following which questions of a potential tariff extension loomed as no final answer was given.
Trump signaled this month that if the two countries can come to an agreement, he intends to meet with the Chinese president before the end of the year.
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