President Donald Trump ruled out giving Beijing advance notice of his intent to slap a new 10 percent tariff on $300 billion in Chinese goods in an Oval Office meeting before he announced the duties, according to several people familiar with the discussion.
During the meeting, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer briefed Trump on their talks in Shanghai this week with their Chinese counterparts. While the White House called the talks "constructive" in a statement issued Wednesday, Trump concluded the two U.S. officials actually came away with nothing, the people said.
"When my people came home, they said 'We're talking, we have another meeting in early September,"' Trump told reporters as he departed the White House on Thursday for a campaign rally. "I said 'That's fine, but in the meantime, until such time as there's a deal, we'll be taxing them.'"