US Reduces Fentanyl Tariff on China to 10 Percent After Trump–Xi Talks
Udumbara
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President Donald Trump on Tuesday officially reduced the U.S. fentanyl-related tariff on Chinese goods to 10 percent, following an in-person meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping in South Korea last month.
“The PRC has committed to take significant measures to end the flow of fentanyl to the United States, including stopping the shipment of certain designated chemicals to North America and strictly controlling exports of certain other chemicals to all destinations in the world,” Trump stated in the executive order, using China’s official name, the People’s Republic of China.
The Department of Homeland Security and the State Department will monitor how China implements measures to stop the flow, Trump stated.
If China fails to implement its commitments, he may “modify this order as necessary,” according to the executive order.
The new tariffs were part of a broader agreement between Trump and Xi, including China suspending its plan to impose stringent export controls on rare earths and resuming the purchase of American soybeans.
Following the announcement of the Trump–Xi deal, some lawmakers expressed concerns about China’s commitments.
Sen. Pete Ricketts (R-Neb.), who serves on the Committee on Foreign Relations, said that the United States “shouldn’t be dependent on selling soybeans to Communist China,” despite the deal.
Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.), who also serves on the Committee on Foreign Relations, warned that Beijing could still impose export restrictions on its rare earths in the future.
“The Chinese have said that they will work on stopping the flow of precursors to North America, that flow into Canada, into Mexico, where they’re made into fentanyl,” Bessent told the outlet.
“We’re going to set up a very strict quantitative criteria, and we'll revisit it in six or 12 months to see whether they’ve accomplished it. And my sense is the tariffs could go up or down. I hope that the Chinese, for the sake of the American people, will live up to this, and we could see a dramatic drop in fentanyl deaths.”
Separately, also on Nov. 5, China’s customs tariff commission announced that it would suspend an additional 24 percent tariff on U.S. goods for one year, starting on Nov. 10, while maintaining a 10 percent blanket tariff, according to China’s state-run media Xinhua.
Also effective on Nov. 10, Chinese tariffs of up to 15 percent on certain U.S. agricultural goods would be removed, according to Xinhua.
China will maintain a 13 percent tariff on U.S. soybean imports.
