Free Republic

During his Senate hearing to be confirmed as ambassador to China, then-Gov. Terry Branstad said he would prefer to serve Iowa beef — not cuts from Australia — at the U.S. Embassy there. He won’t get that wish yet, but the prime rib he slices into Friday when joined in Beijing by U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue and Chinese government officials to ceremonially mark the return of U.S. beef to China after a 14-year ban will be from closer to home — Nebraska. Branstad: Work to open Chinese market to U.S. beef exports Trump calls for rural internet...

Theresa May has hailed the "powerful vote of confidence" in Britain Donald Trump and other world leaders have shown with their "strong desire" to strike new trade deals after Brexit. The Prime Minister said she is "optimistic and positive" about a future pact with the US after the president said he believed an agreement could be reached "very, very quickly". Following talks on the margins of the G20 summit in Hamburg, Mr Trump hailed the "very special relationship" he had developed with the PM. He said he expected an agreement on new trading arrangements with Britain to be "very powerful"....

Donald Trump has promised to sign a trade deal with Britain "very very quickly" as he told Theresa May: "There is no country that could possibly be closer than our countries." The US President said he had developed a "very special relationship" with Mrs May as the two leaders sat down for a one-on-one meeting at the G20 summit in Hamburg this morning. (CHART-AT-LINK) He also told Mrs May he had "a tremendous meeting" with President Vladimir Putin of Russia on Friday, which lasted for two and a quarter hours. The President's comments are a huge boost for Mrs May,...

The upcoming NAFTA trade discussions between the U.S., Mexico and Canada will be more interesting, and far more consequential, than any trilateral trade discussion in our lifetime. We can anticipate dozens of congressional masks to drop each day as the tentacles of their financial interests and corporate donors will gain a level of sunlight never before seen. For the first time in our lifetime the corporatist’s within the U.S. CoC lobby will be neutered, and Republicans owned by Wall Street will have no choice but to openly rail against America while embracing their friends in the MSM.

Caribbean Foreign Ministers, including Belizean Foreign Minister Wilfred Elrington, attended a meeting in Grenada yesterday with two officials from the new U.S. administration of President Donald Trump. “Basically I thought they wanted to tell us they still have an interest in us and to hear our concerns and interests, and so we told them the various ills confronting our region,” Elrington told the Caribbean Media Corporation (CMC) following the talks. UnderSecretary of State for Political Affairs Thomas A Shannon Jr. and Acting Assistant Secretary for Western Hemisphere Affairs, Francisco Palmieri, met with the foreign ministers on the sidelines of the...

Nikki Haley warns China on trade with North Korea if it wants U.S. trade UNITED NATIONS (AP) — U.S. Ambassador Nikki Haley warned China on Wednesday that it risks its massive trade with the United States if its business with North Korea violates U.N. sanctions. In a hard-hitting speech at an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council following Pyongyang's successful launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile, she said that "the world has become a more dangerous place" and China has a key role in promoting peace and "preventing a catastrophe."

U.S. President Donald Trump urged Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to do more to relax Indian trade barriers on Monday during talks in which both leaders took great pains to stress the importance of a strong U.S.-Indian relationship. At a closely watched first meeting between the two, Trump and Modi appeared to get along well. Modi pulled in Trump for a bear hug on the stage as the cameras rolled in the Rose Garden. "I deeply appreciate your strong commitment to the enhancement of our bilateral relations," Modi told him. "I am sure that under your leadership a mutually beneficial...

US President Donald Trump ordered an investigation into curbing steel imports amid “national security” fears in April. Washington is expected to decide whether to impose tariffs this week. The investigation has mainly been aimed at cheap imports from China but has sparked concern from European steel exporters who worry they will be targeted by the US crackdown. The EU’s trade commissioner Cecilia Malmström says Brussels “will need to respond” if Mr Trump decides to impose tariffs on steel from the EU, China and other countries. She told Politico: “We should be very, very clear …. [that] this is hitting the...

Here's why Rajeev Srinivasan believes there will be nothing particularly positive about the prime minister's US visit. IMAGE: The fact that it has taken this long for the US to extend an invitation to Narendra Modi suggests that India is not on Donald Trump's event horizon. Photographs: Peter Nicholls/Getty Images and Carlos Barria/Reuters Prime Minister Narendra Modi is not naive, so he is surely approaching his fifth visit to the United States, and his first meeting with US President Donald Trump with careful preparation. He is also deliberately creating low expectations. Unlike the hoopla of his previous Madison Square Gardens...

Those eager to ensure friction, want Trump to bring up issues that impinge on India’s sovereignty, aware that Modi would react strongly to any such efforts. Both during the 2016 Presidential campaign trail and in his previous avatar as a billionaire businessperson, President Donald John Trump had integrated India as a core component of the global order in his policies and actions. However, since his inauguration on 20 January and subsequently, very little mention has been made of India in the statements made by spokespersons for the Trump administration, while, as yet, several posts relevant to relations with India (such...

Seeking to "roll out a red-carpet welcome" to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, US President Donald Trump would host him for a working dinner at the White House on Monday, the first of its kind under this administration. "The White House is very interested in making this a special visit. We're really seeking to roll out the red carpet. In fact, the two (leaders) will have dinner, a working dinner at the White House. “This will be the first dinner for a foreign dignitary at the White House under this administration. So, we think that's very significant," a senior administration official...

Washington -- Even as the Trump administration is cosying up to the Chinese, the US will need India to counter Beijing's growing influence in the world, a top American think-tank has said. Describing India as a "key piece in the jigsaw" for the US, the Atlantic Council urged the Trump administration to prioritise its ties with New Delhi. "Given the advancements that China has made both economically and militarily, the US will need to channel considerable resources to assert its global and regional primacy," Atlantic Council, a top American think-tank said in a policy paper 'Transforming India from a Balancing...

Up until Donald Trump’s election it looked like the trade wars were largely over. Policymakers in both parties seemed to have accepted full integration of the United States into the global economy was both a good and a goal. Trump turned that on its head. He built his Electoral College majority on the resentment of folks who believed free trade and global commerce helped create jobs for other people in other places while leaving them behind. It’s a powerful message that’s starting to resonate in Congress. Even Texas Rep. Kevin Brady, chairman of the House Committee on Ways and Means...

Trudeau complimented Trump but downplayed his importance to the Canada-U.S. relationship in an interview at the University of Toronto on Thursday, saying that the U.S. president “knows how to interact socially on a very effective level.” According to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, U.S. President Donald Trump is a willing listener with good social skills who keeps his word and is open to changing his mind when presented with opposing positions. Trudeau, who has made a determined effort to avoid angering the mercurial president, offered his complimentary assessment in a public interview with two New York Times journalists at the University...

Beijing (AFP) - China opened its gates to US beef imports this week, giving American cattle farmers much sought-after access to the country's massive market following a 14-year ban. Shipments of eligible US beef have been allowed to enter China since Tuesday, the General Adminstration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine said in a statement. Announced last month, the lifting of the beef embargo was one of the first concrete results of trade discussions that began when Chinese President Xi Jinping met with Donald Trump at the US leader's resort in Florida in April.

As Wall Street’s ‘fear gauge’ nears all-time lows, one commonly used measure shows Asian equities near their least volatile this century. The calm that has descended on U.S. financial markets is stretching around the world. Based on one commonly used measure, Asian equities are near their least volatile this century—a byproduct of improving corporate earnings, stabilizing economic growth and the diminishing impact of geopolitical events on markets. In the U.S., Wall Street’s “fear gauge” is near all-time lows, and in Europe, volatility has also largely subsided.

There were not many open seats at a pair of meetings last week over proposed routes that would send Interstate 11 through the Tucson area. Many of those in attendance were there to speak against two of the alternatives, which run west of Saguaro National Park West in the Avra Valley.“I understand the need to provide ways for people to move around," said Kimberly Baeza, "But it doesn't have to come at the expense of our open landscapes and beautiful Sonoran Desert.”The meeting is part of the second step in selecting the route I-11 could take through Arizona. The freeway...

US President Donald Trump discussed trade with Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc during a White House visit on Wednesday (May 31) and welcomed the signing of business deals worth billions of dollars and the jobs they would bring. General Electric Co said it had signed deals with Vietnam worth about US$5.58 billion for power generation, aircraft engines and services, its largest ever single combined sale with the country. "They just made a very large order in the United States - and we appreciate that - for many billions of dollars, which means jobs for the United States and great,...

Those of us of a certain age have a real attachment with Hawaii. We defended her when Japan attacked. We celebrated when she officially became a state in 1959. And we dreamed of vacations on her picturesque beaches. We also remember those commercials about sweet Hawaiian sugar for which the islands were synonymous. Not anymore. Hawaii stopped producing sugar entirely in December, after more than a century in the business. Not because Hawaii isn't good at producing sugar — it was one of the best. It's because Mexico violated United States trade laws, dumped subsidized sugar on the market, distorted...

Given the vacuity of last week's European meetings, one may question why was it necessary for the U.S. president to spend four days and all that money to repeat for the nth time to people who took $165 billion net out of their U.S. trade in 2016 what he has been telling them over the last two years. No European leader has been in any doubt for quite some time that (a) trillions of dollars in U.S. trade deficits and a soaring net foreign debt of $8.1 trillion could not continue, (b) trade policies would be reviewed with particular attention...