China is falling well short of the purchase totals it committed to under the Phase One trade deal with former President Donald Trump, according to the non-partisan Peterson Institute for International Economics (PIIE).
Trump’s trade deal with China went into effect in February 2020, with China agreeing to expand purchases of U.S. products by $200 billion for the two-year period between January 2020 and December 2021. The country has yet to meet that commitment, increasing purchases by just 58 percent of the agreed-upon total in 2020, and 69 percent as of July 2021, according to a report from the PIIE.
In total, China has fallen more than $108 billion behind its purchasing commitments: $73.1 billion in 2020 and $35 billion so far in 2021.
UPDATED: Through July 2021, China’s purchases of all products covered by the Phase One trade agreement reached less than 70% of year-to-date targets. #PIIECharts
Learn more: https://t.co/euxOIAugMj pic.twitter.com/EXlNnyOwHH— Peterson Institute (@PIIE) September 9, 2021
Trump signed the trade deal in January 2020 and argued that it heralded an easing of tensions between China and the U.S. Those tensions seemed to have become more severe under President Joe Biden.
“Today we take a momentous step, one that has never been taken before with China, toward a future affair and reciprocal trade as we sign phase one of the historic trade deal between the United States and China,” Trump said at the time. “Together we are righting the wrongs of the past and delivering a future of economic justice and security for American workers, farmers and families.”
Biden stated that he has no plans to renegotiate the trade deal and plans to keep the Trump-era tariffs against China in place. (RELATED: Biden Says He’ll Keep Trump’s China Trade Deal And Tariffs — At Least For Now)
While the phase one agreement called for further deliberation and meetings to create phase two and phase three trade deals, the talks never made any meaningful progress under Trump’s administration. Biden has announced no plans to push his U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) back into negotiations with China.
The president has framed the struggle between the U.S. and China as one that will determine whether democracy or autocracy will lead the world into the future. He has ordered the Pentagon to reorient itself with China as a top priority and hopes to work with U.S. allies to economically isolate China.