On Friday’s broadcast of the Fox Business Network’s “Mornings with Maria,” Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) stated that he is open to ending China’s most-favored nation trade status and that giving the status to China along with their membership in the World Trade Organization hasn’t worked, “because they’re not playing by the rules.”
Host Maria Bartiromo asked, “I’m wondering what you believe the U.S. has in terms of leverage here, because right now we know that the CCP has most-favored nation status when it comes to trade. Congressman, is that one of the levers that you could pull to keep the CCP in check? Would you pursue removing that most-favored nation status for China’s trade?”
Khanna responded, “I’m open to it. And I certainly think we have a lot of leverage. We’re the customer. We’re the buyer. We’re — they’re far more dependent on us buying than we are on them. I am certainly open to strategic tariffs, to making sure that they’re not dumping. And I have said that the president should have a clear goal, let’s have a trade balance with China by the end of the decade. … They don’t buy from us and we buy from them. This is why I don’t understand why TikTok is even an issue, of course, they should be forced to sell it. They don’t allow any of our tech companies in there. They don’t allow Twitter, they don’t allow Facebook, they don’t allow Snap. So why should we have an unreciprocal relationship? I guess we need to insist on the economic relationship being balanced.”
Bartiromo then asked, “Do you think that comes to the floor any time soon to remove the most-favored nation status?”
Khanna answered, “It is something that our committee is exploring and we’re going to have unanimous recommendations. I know that there was a manufacturing council that recommended that. … I actually think you can get bipartisan consensus that the most-favored status and World Trade Organization [membership] of China didn’t work, because they’re not playing by the rules.”
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett
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