Donald Trump's 2024 presidential campaign rolls on with the announcement that Trump would eliminate China’s most favored nation trade status and ban federal contracts for companies that outsource to China.
"Joe Biden claims to support American manufacturing, but in reality, he is pushing the same pro-China globalist agenda that ripped the industrial heart out of our country," Trump said in a policy video, titled "Pro-American Trade to End our Reliance on China."
The "America First" trade platform "takes a sledgehammer to globalism," Trump said
"Very simply, the Biden agenda taxes America to build up China," Trump said. "My agenda will tax China to build up America."
As a matter of "both economic and national security," Trump said his plan would also "implement a bold series of reforms to completely eliminate dependence on China in all critical areas."
He said his plan to phase out all imports of essential goods from China over four years would cover a range of goods and mechanisms to enforce the tough new rules.
"Everything from electronics to steel to pharmaceuticals," Trump said. "This will include strong protections to ensure China cannot circumvent restrictions by passing goods through conduit countries – countries that don't make a product, but all of a sudden they're selling a lot of product. It comes right through China, right out of China, and right into our country."
"We will also adopt new rules to stop U.S. companies from pouring investment into China, and to stop China from buying up America, allowing all of those investments that clearly serve American interests," Trump said, adding that he would also "eliminate federal contracts for any company that outsources to China."
The plan "rewards domestic production and taxes foreign companies and those who export American jobs."
Trump said he would phase in a system of universal, baseline tariffs on most foreign products. The higher tariffs, he said, will "increase incrementally depending on how much individual foreign countries devalue their currency."
"As tariffs on foreign producers go up, taxes on American producers will go down, and go down very substantially, that means a lot of jobs coming in," Trump said.
Trump said his proposed system would "end our gaping trade deficits" and bring back "millions" of American jobs. He said it would also bring "trillions and trillions of dollars" to the U.S. Treasury Department from foreign countries, which could then be invested in "American workers, American families and American communities."
"This plan will be the linchpin of a new Strategic National Manufacturing Initiative, that builds on my historic success in ending NAFTA," Trump said, calling the ending of the North American Free Trade Agreement a "tremendous achievement."
Trump replaced NAFTA with the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), which covered more than $1.3 trillion of commerce. The USMCA requires 75% of automobile components be manufactured in the United States, Canada or Mexico in order to avoid tariffs. The deal required that by 2023, some 40 to 45% of automobile parts must be made by workers who earn at least $16 an hour.
Trump also withdrew the United States from the controversial Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal, which was advocated by the Obama administration and aimed to deepen economic ties between the U.S. and 11 other Pacific Rim nations.
"We're also going to end other unfair trade deals, and we'll end them quickly," Trump said.
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