Washington sources reported that an official announcement was expected on Friday, an informed source told on Thursday that Trump's approval came after a meeting on Thursday with top economic officials, including Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer.
Moreover in response to the development, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang reiterated that Beijing would not honor its pledge to increase purchases of US goods if tariffs were imposed. Earlier Beijing said it would respond to American tariffs on $50 billion worth of Chinese exports with retaliatory tariffs on $50 billion of US products such as cars, planes and soybeans.
Furthermore for months, Trump has slow walked threats of tariffs against
China as punishment for intellectual property theft. Accordingly he first
announced that the US would impose trade penalties on about $50 billion of
Chinese goods in March. Moreover the countries said in a joint statement that
China would "significantly increase" purchases of US agricultural and
energy products to reduce the trade imbalance, a top Trump administration
demand. Mnuchin subsequently declared the trade war "on hold".
