Taipei, Taiwan – When US President Donald Trump began his first term in 2017, he set out to implement Washington’s most Hawkish economic policy against China in decades.
In the first 100 days of his second term, Trump took over Washington’s conflict with Beijing to a heightened level, laying out a solid protectionist trade agenda that led to a de facto trade embargo between the two largest economies in the world.
US tariffs for most Chinese products have risen to 145% and for some items to 245%, but loopholes that previously allowed Chinese exporters to avoid existing tariffs have been closed.
China, in response, imposes a 125% tariff on most US goods, in addition to other retaliatory measures such as export restrictions on important minerals and strict restrictions on the number of Hollywood films shown in Chinese cinemas.
Trump’s trade war comes from what he left off in his first administration, shaped by a long-standing belief that China and other countries are using trade ties with the United States.
“It’s more or less a continuity in terms of goals and direction, perhaps more powerful and more resolved.
According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis, the US trade deficit reached $91.84 billion in 2024, with a record $1.2 trillion in commodity deficit.
In Trump’s worldview, China, the third largest trading partner in the United States after Mexico and Canada, is one of the worst exploiters.
“Trump believes China is free to ride in an era of globalization and exploited US consumers,” said Dennis Wilder, a former White House official and senior fellow at Georgetown University’s initiative for US-China dialogue on global issues.
“He wants to balance trade and create good jobs for Americans, and he wants Chinese investment in the US to create good blue-collar jobs. He wants US companies to have far more sales capabilities in China.”
Trump launched his first trade war with China in 2018 in response to what he allegedly was unfair trade practices and intellectual property theft by Chinese companies.
Over the next two years, his administration imposed tariffs on $300 million in Chinese goods.
While campaigning for reelection last year, Trump revealed that if he returns to the White House, he will strike China with even more sudden tariffs.
Trump’s anti-China trade stance since January was not surprising, but his tariff scope and volatile, volatile, off-off nature surprised observers and served as China’s assistant US trade representative under former US President Barack Obama.
“I was surprised Trump was elected in 2016 and wasn’t ready to take office. However, in 2025, Project 2025 gave him a detailed playbook containing mutual tariffs and began his execution in an inauguration speech,” Moon, who leads Consultancy China Moon Strategies, told Al Jazeera.
Most of Trump’s original tariffs were maintained and expanded further by former US President Joe Biden, but Wilder said Trump is motivated by different values when the Biden administration portrays the US-China competition as an ideological battle between democracy and authoritarianism.
“As revealed in the second term, Trump is not a geo-economic president, he is geo-economic,” he said.
“Trump will not seek President XI’s end or separate him from the Chinese economy unless he wants to give the US what China considers to be a fair deal in economic relations,” Wilder added, referring to Chinese President Xi Jinping.
“Unsustainable” tariffs
Over the past few weeks, Trump and White House officials have publicly said they want to negotiate with China and lower the 145% tariff rate.
Trump said his administration is in active negotiations with Beijing on trade. Chinese officials argue that such talks have not yet begun.
Washington, D.C.-based analyst Ray Wang said his focus is on the three-dimensional regions of the US-China economy, and that Trump’s strategy to maximize pressure on China could backfire and push Beijing towards a further “decup” from the US economy.
“Faced with embargo levels of tariffs and strengthening Hawkish’s rhetoric, Beijing is unlikely to engage in meaningful negotiations, complicating efforts to address the highly economic concerns that the policy aims to resolve,” Wang told Al Jazera.
Marina Chang, an associate professor at the Institute of Australia and China Relations at Sydney Institute for Technology Australia and China, said Chinese manufacturers may turn more and more into other countries to isolate themselves from the US economy.
“For China, this shows both risks and opportunities. While exporters to the US face immediate pressure, Beijing’s broader push for market diversification — ASEAN, Africa and Latin America will gain new urgency and traction,” Zhang told Al Jazeera.
As the US-China trade war unfolds, Trump has also set his sights on US trade with other countries in general.
For the past 100 days, Trump has hit Mexico and Canada.
On April 2nd, he expanded the trade war to over 180 countries and territories with the announcement of so-called “mutual tariffs” of 10-49%.
Trump then suspended tariffs for 90 days in anticipation of country-by-country negotiations, but he continues to let his Chinese trading partners close loopholes for US exports.
“The difference (from his first term) is that Trump’s Chinese strategy is part of a global economic strategy. For example, he wants to make sure China does not circumvent fairness in US-China trade, as it cuts new trade deals with Japan, South Korea, Singapore and others.”
Drew Thompson, a senior fellow at S Rajaratnam International Studies School in Singapore, said Trump’s ultimate goal is to rewrite the long-standing “Washington Consensus” that supports free trade and market liberalization into something shaped by his image.
“The Trump administration is changing the nature of its economic and security partnerships, essentially changing its relationship with the whole world. It’s not specifically directed towards China,” Thompson told Al Jazeera.
“This is about Trump’s perception that the US has used globalization and has not benefited from globalization, and frankly reflects the perception of American voters of the same thing.”