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Joining us now as we parse through everything that has happened in twenty twenty five around the trade story is the twentieth US Trade Representative.
Jamison Greer.
Representative Greer, I want to start on how busy twenty twenty five really was looking ahead to twenty twenty six. Do you expect the same kind of pace with respect to trade deals with respect to trade announcements.
Well, during twenty twenty five, President Trump the administration has essentially reset the global trading order to move from total liberal trade in the United States without any cost to a new fair and balanced approach. We we've announced lots of trade deals, We've announced lots of tariffs, as you know, in the coming year, we expect to finalize a bunch of those trade deals as well. You know, I think that the tariff plan is in good shape. I think we have a lot of the tariffs we want in place.
You know, if there are countries here and there that don't comply with their deals or don't want to finish a deal, then maybe we have.
To have another conversation.
But I think the economy's booming, inflations, down wages, are up.
We're in a really great track.
How much are you potentially at risk should the Supreme Court overturn some of the tariffs that have been enacted under the AEPA provision. Do you have something in place to get those tariffs through other measures or will there be a rethink about what will be put on and what won't.
Well, it would be terrible if the Supreme Court overturned the case because we have built a new global trading order on the back of these tariffs and the tariff system and our trading partners have accepted it, and they've made deals and they've accepted there's going to be some tariff leveled help protect US industry.
So it would be disaster if this was pulled out.
All that being said, we will do whatever we need to do to make sure that we can maintain the tariffs we need and keep the deals in place. Obviously, we want the flexibility of the emergency powers that Congress has given to the President. It's the most effective way to deal with it. So what's made them so effective this year in negotiating. But absent that, you know, we'll work and we'll find a way to make sure we can keep all these games we've made over the past year.
Representative Greer, there's also a feeling right now that cost of living concerns are coming to the fore. And President Trump has talked about removing some of tariffs on specific goods, particularly having to do with food, is a way of alleviating some of the price concerns. How does that factor into discussions going forward? Do you think that that will be an increasing part of your thought process as you go through some of these trade negotiations.
Well, any good president wants to address affordability, and our president is and over the past month we saw you know, dairy, you know, fruit and vegetables, all kinds of prices go down for basic stables, staples. So that's a great development going forward. The President removed some tariffs in connection with some deals related to food coming from a broad bananas, coffee, coco, the kinds of things we just don't make in the n United States is a food powerhouse.
When we saw.
Inflation earlier, it's really about causing healthcare driven by Obamacare disaster. So I don't think that, you know, food imports are really going to be an issue for us. You know, the tariff program is really about creating jobs, and the presence regulatory approach is really about bringing prices down and bringing affordability.
Ambassador.
Have you had any specific directives from the President though, as you carry out your negotiations to make sure any tariffs you put on from here are anyones that you negotiate specifically are not having an impact on affordability.
So you know, the kind of the way you put it there a specific direction, I would say no. Whenever we're imposing tariffs are doing deals. The purpose of the trade program is to reshore American manufacturing and protect American food security. It's really about jobs and increasing wages, which
we've seen over the past few months. When it comes to prices, the President is undertaking a lot of other actions, you know, energy policy, tax policy, regulatory gas prices are down, etc. So we don't see the trade policy really as driving prices. We see it as driving jobs.
Ambassador.
I'd love to go back where Lisa started, and that is it looks more likely that we indeed have something of a TikTok deal where US buyers will take the American portion. You after some of the negotiations in Madrid, we're talking about how this deal, how this company was part and parcel of a variety of matters when it comes to negotiation, negotiating with your Chinese counterparts. So have you had more discussions about this deal with TikTok. Does it seem likely that China will let it happen.
So there are two layers to the TikTok deal. One is the private sector layer, where the private parties are concluding a deal, and then there's a layer of government approvals.
Between the United States and China.
And so my conversations with the Chinese government over the past few months, as you mentioned, have covered a variety of issues.
One of them has been TikTok.
Back at our discussions in Madrid, we came to an essential agreement that if the private parties came to agreement, that the Chinese.
Would approve it. So we expect approval by.
The government of China in alignment with that agreement we reached earlier this year.
We're hearing about not only this deal with respect to TikTok and some investors in the US, but also a review process to sell two hundred chips into China. And I'm just wondering, stepping back, if all of these are pieces of a bigger deal that will come to fruition in twenty twenty six between the US and China.
I would say with the H two hundred export control issues, those really are standalone. That was not a negotiated outcome in the United States. With respect to export controls, those are not something that are really subject to negotiation. Those are national security and commercial decisions made by the federal government. So that's kind of standing on its own. With respect to the rest of the China deal. Right now, we're trying to make sure that rare earths continue flowing from China.
You know, they bought over five million metric tons of soybeans at this point, and we're trying to keep trade flowing between the two countries in the way that makes sense.
Do you expect a bigger deal other than just sort of steady reset kind of idea that you've talked about with respect to the US and China. Do you expect something more comprehensive to be outlined next year.
It's a little hard to say at this point. Goal one is stability. For me, and everyone's heard me say this before. We need trade with China to be much more balanced. Our trade deficit with China has decreased by twenty five percent this year alone under President Trump's.
Policy, so that's going the right direction.
I can first see a situation in the first half of next year where we come to some kind of agreement with China on exactly what we should be trading with each other and even in what volumes. It's a little bit of managed trade, but it's the kind of thing that can be healthy and stable. You know, Given the way that Chinese government runs its economy, it just doesn't mesh very well with the way we want to run our economy. That just means we have to manage it a little bit more. And I think there's a
possibility of that. I'm not sure i'd call it comprehensive, call it confidence building, Ambassador.
I think a lot of the confusion from many people comes around national security. One of the points that you mentioned just a moment ago, especially things with H two hundred chips giving chips to China has seen an issue of national security. Even giving F thirty fives to Saudi Arabia, what does that mean for national security? Because critics would say that it means that national security is up for sale.
What would you say to those critics.
So with respect to the F thirty five, that's not my I used to be in the Air Force, but it's not it's not my wheelhouse. I'm h two hundreds and export controls generally, export controls have always been fluid, They've never been static. The very nature of export controls is that the US government is constantly reviewing the state of technology and assessing what technologies can be sold and which ones can't, and balancing national security and assessing whether
or not there's foreign availability. Everyone knows that the Chinese are quickly also trying to develop their own AI chips, semiconductor tool to make those chips, etc.
It's a race. All of those Age two hundred approvals still have.
To go through the Commerce Department to make sure that any licenses that are granted really respect US national security and make sure that it's not violated, and there can be conditions on licenses, etc. To make sure they go to end users and end uses that don't jeopardize US national security.
Is it fair to say that, Ambassador that even if this does go through the kind of cases where this is allowed, where it's approved, will still be quite limited in scope.
So it's hard to say at this point that these types of license applications are typically a case by case and.
Reviewed, so we'll see.
The way it's set up right now is if the chips are going to go to China, they come back to the US for a security inspection to make sure that they are indeed the types of chips that are being allowed to be sent to the Chinese. We know there are a lot of Chinese companies that want them. We know the Chinese government's pretty interested in having their own domestic champions build them. So the Chinese themselves right now are having a conversation about the types of chips
that they want from the United States. We think that they want the Age two Hunters. They've shown an interest in that, so we'll see between their process and ours, we'll see where it goes.
It seems like the tech wars have been behind a lot of the negotiations over the past twelve months, in particular not only with China but.
Also the European Union.
I'm just wondering where some of those discussions are with respect to some of the restrictions and regulatory investigations Europe has been making toward US tech companies.
Where are some of those discussions.
So I just had a conversation yesterday with my counterpart in the European Trade in the European Commission yesterday to reinforce some of the strong concerns we're hearing from US stakeholders. US tech companies are the most competitive in the world, and Europe frankly doesn't have those types of competitors. If you talk to the Europeans, they'll say, that's why we have to regulate and have these protectionist measures against US tech companies. Unfortunately, we see in the way that they've
developed those measures they're discriminatory. They only capture companies above a certain threshold of revenue globally or certain business models, and magically it only happens to capture US companies. They'll say that they're Chinese companies too, but we only see actions against American companies.
So it's a problem. It's discriminatory in fact.
You'll hear the European say, well, it's fair, but it's discriminatory in fact and in intent.
So I want to talk to these folks. I want to negotiate over it.
They've been somewhat resistant to that, but again I had a great conversation yesterday with the European Trade Commissioner, and I think we just have to be able to talk about why they're doing this, why they're purporting to regulate American companies and their global business models.
Ambassador.
Coming into twenty twenty five, a lot of people were wondering who are allies and who our adversaries would be on trade, and we were talking about who traditionally have been US allies and who haven't. Have you been surprised and who's been most difficult to deal with in twenty twenty It has surprised a lot of people in the markets to see the likes of Europe be a more contentious discussion than other regions, even sometimes China.
That's because they haven't been trade negotiators. I have not been surprised at where it's been more challenging. Take India, for example, who's an important partner and a strategic partner in a lot of ways. We started negotiating with them early in the year and we're still negotiating.
With them to trying to find a good landing zone.
During that time, we have other trade partners who have come in, started proceeded with and concluded trade negotiations with US, etc. The reality is somebody like Europe and frankly you know some jurisdictions that want to emulate them. They know they might have relatively low tariffs compared to the rest of the world, but they have non tariff barriers, regulations that exclude American agriculture, which is a major exports, and regulations
that exclude are industrial exports. And so you get into it. And this is why we have giant and balances. It's not because Europe is really competitive, we know they're not. It's because they have a lot of these rules that prevent US goods and services from going into the continent.
Ambassador Greer just to finish up on Mexico.
Which has been negotiating.
From what we understand, they just recently gave final approval to put tariffs on certain Chinese imports, and a lot of people are expecting there to be some sort of reprieve with respect to aluminum and steel tariffs on Mexico.
Is there any discussion about that going on right now?
So, first of all, any country in the world who exports steel and aluminum to the United States wants to have a modification to that regime. Because the United States for many years has been the consumer of last resort, and this is why the President put steel loomed tariffs on in the first administration. The Biden administration kept them, and the President has tightened them further in his second administration.
Of course, the Mexicans are asking for this. We have found the Mexicans to be quite constructive in some of our recent discussions and looking to change some of their laws and regulations related to long.
Standing US concerns.
So have the Mexicans asked about this, Yes, you know, I won't give any further detail beyond that, but it's certainly something that they would like to see.
It's not surprising.
Ambassador Greer, thank you so much for being with us this morning, and have a wonderful rust of the year. Ambassador Jamison Greer speaking with us