Wednesday on FBN’s “Mornings with Maria,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent argued efforts to counter U.S. tariffs with further retaliatory tariffs were a “loser” for China.
According to Bessent, there were no winners, but the “proportionality for the Chinese” would be much worse.
“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. They have the most imbalanced economy in the history of the modern world,” Bessent said. “And, you know, I can tell you that this escalation is a loser for them, that they have some very smart — the economists … technocrats within their bureaucracy. And they would be telling the leadership that ‘we do not have the edge here.’ They are the surplus country, their exports to the U.S. are five times our exports to China. So they can raise their tariffs — but so what?”
He continued, “No one wins in a war, but it’s proportionality — and the proportionality for the Chinese is going to be much worse. And the other thing too, Maria, what would be a very good step with the Chinese would be acknowledging that the precursor chemicals for fentanyl come from China. They make their way into North America and then are sold into the U.S. We have more than 100,000 American citizens dying every year.”
(h/t Daily Caller)
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