China’s finance ministry has announced an additional 84 percent tariff on all goods imported from the United States, set to take effect on Thursday.
On April 9, the Chinese communist regime said that these rules would be enforced from midday, Beijing time, (12:01 a.m. ET) on April 10. The 84 percent tariff replaces the previously announced 34 percent tariff.
On April 2, Trump announced a minimum 10 percent tariff on all trading partners, as well as higher levies on about 60 nations identified by the administration as “worst offenders” in trade imbalances with the United States, including an additional 34 percent tariff on China.
When China responded with tit-for-tat 34 percent retaliatory levies on U.S. goods, Trump imposed an extra 50 percent on the Chinese regime, amounting to 104 percent total tariffs on Chinese imports, which came into effect from 12:01 a.m. ET on Wednesday.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Wednesday morning criticized China’s retaliation.
“I think it’s unfortunate that the Chinese actually don’t want to come and negotiate, because they are the worst offenders in the international trading system,” Bessent said in an interview with Fox Business Network.
He said that the “proportionality for the Chinese is going to be much worse.”
He said that a very good step for the Chinese would be “acknowledging that the precursor chemicals for fentanyl come from China.”
When asked if he was prepared to remove Chinese stocks from U.S. exchanges, Bessent said “everything is on the table.”
“The U.S. is trying to rebalance toward more manufacturing. China needs to rebalance towards more consumption,” he said.
Bessent also warned Beijing not to devalue its currency.
“If China starts devaluing, then that is a tax on the rest of the world and everyone will have to keep raising their tariffs to offset the devaluation. So I would urge them not to do that and to come to the table,” he said.
