welcome back President elect Trump nominating Jameson Greer to be the next us trade representative Greer served as the former Chief of Staff to Bob ligh Heiser Trump's trade representative during his first term he was instrumental in imposing tariffs on China Greer has advocated for strategic decoupling from China saying the cost of doing nothing or underestimating the threat posed by China is far greater Beijing meanwhile responding to Trump's threat of putting an additional 10% tariff on China for their role in the deadly fentol crisis a spokesperson at the Chinese Embassy in Washington writes this on X
China US economic and trade cooperation is mutually beneficial in nature no one will win a trade war or a tariff War tau is Gatestone Institute senior fellow and author of plan R China's project to destroy America Gordon Chang Gordon great to see you do you agree with that statement from China no one wins I don't agree um matter of fact China which is a trade Surplus country can't win a trade war with the United States this year through September China's merchandise Trade Surplus with the United States was 27.5 billion that means we have 2175 billion
reasons why we will win a trade War President Trump is absolutely determined to do so and I'm sure that we will well I mean look what about the thought that if in fact we see all of these tariffs and by the way I agree with you but I want to push back here because I want to get in the thinking of some of the globalists out there who are afraid that tariffs are only going to lead to inflation and higher prices that Americans pay for goods what do you think well in 2018 when Trump's first
round of section 301 tariffs China picked up somewhere between 75 to 81% of the cost of those tariffs people in China have done studies of the economic impact and found that in 2008 18 those tariffs caused five times more had five times greater cost to China than to the United States which confirms these estimates that we have seen so yeah globalists can say what they want but the facts are the facts in 2018 there was virtually no inflationary impact and by the way Maria China this month has been driving down the value of the remb
which is making Chinese products cheaper China is already absorbing the cost of the anticipated tariffs yeah yeah I I I think you're right on that I I I think that's terrific analysis Gordon I want to get your take on what the Wall Street Journal is reporting that China is now looking to Elon Musk as a channel into president-elect Trump musk of course has had a long history in Beijing tesla7 billion Shanghai plant being the electric car company's biggest Factory the company's first overseas plant mosque has also had a relationship with Chinese Premier Lee Quang who
back in April called MOS quote a dear friend the CEO of Chinese owned Tick Tock uh show Cho has reached out to mosque to get Counsel on the incoming Trump Administration as well is this going to be China's way in to change policy through musque well Chinese academics think so they know that there is no replacement for Henry Kissinger um but they're now in China talking about the three kissers one of them is Elon Musk the other two are Tim Cook of apple and the Steve schwarzman of Blackstone um I don't know if China's hopes
are realistic but we know that Tesla that factory you showed um that factory in Shanghai accounts for more than half of the Teslas in the world and that last year Tesla got 22.5% of its revenues from China and by the way Tesla's market share in China is slipping fast especially in the third quarter of this year and so what we're seeing right now is China does have extraord Ary leverage over U Elon Musk yeah he they've got extraordinary leverage but I don't know that President Trump is going to need any of the these people giving
him advice he has shown us that he knows how to deal with xiin pink from day one when he had jiin ping over to Mar Lago in his first term he was the second leader Global leader to come and and Trump basically schooled him yes he did um uh over that dinner um when Trump stood up and said he had launched missiles in Syria which is a China friend cin ping was absolutely flx he was quiet and he was relatively well behaved for the four years of Trump's first term yeah that was really important the
message that Trump sent but what about China's military deploying Naval and Air Forces to follow and monitor a US Navy Patrol aircraft that flew through the Taiwan straight they uh will not allow a us uh jet to fly over the Taiwan straight without intimidation Gordon a spokesperson for the Chinese says that the US is threatening peace and stability in the region just by being there Gordon your reaction yeah China always does this and the Flight of the p8 on Tuesday through the Taiwan straight is another indication of China's uh use of its military to intimidate
others including the United States the one of the good things Maria is that this month China has been uncharacteristically quiet in its peripheral Waters and space um and I think this is chalked up to president Trump's election the Chinese don't want to take him on and so clearly the Chinese right now are worried about Trump and they're thinking about how to deal with him but in the meantime um again um they've been quiet yeah it's a great it's a great point I agree with you but what about the idea that China is also one of
the major buyers of our debt how Reliant are we on that let me bring at Adam Johnson on that because Adam you've been zeroing in on the amount amount of bonds that China buys yeah it's staggering Maria actually they buy more of our bonds than anybody so um Gordon my question to you while I agree that we have leverage over the Chinese because they need us to buy their goods um we need them to buy our bonds what happens if we ratchet up the sanctions and uh or not sanctions we ratchet up the tariffs and
then uh you know we've got to deal with the shortfall in the bonds how do we deal with that I don't think we have to worry because everybody wants to hold US dollars right now and so especially in a trump Administration where our economy will be resurgent I don't think we need the Chinese to buy our debt you know since 2008 China has been threatening to dump our debt to hurt us they never do it they call it the nuclear option and they don't do it because they realize the markets are so broad around the
world that has will have no effect on the US they can maybe you know disrupt things for a couple weeks but that's about it Adam all right well that's that's that's good if that's uh the case uh because otherwise they would have serious leverage Gordon it's great to see you thanks very much Happy Thanksgiving Gordon Happy Thanksgiving to you Maria and thank you so much for all of your support we're grateful to you
