White House National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett said Tuesday the administration is waiting to announce trade deals until after President Trump’s megabill passes Congress, which the president is pressuring Republicans to do by the Fourth of July recess.
Hassett said the administration is focused on trade talks this week when he was questioned about where deals are after he and others in the administration have said announcements are coming soon for weeks.
“I think that what we’re focusing on this week — obviously, there’s been quite a bit going on —but I had to call on a reconciliation package question with [Commerce Secretary] Howard Lutnick yesterday. He picked up right away, and he was in the middle of trade negotiations,” Hassett said on Fox Business Network’s “Varney & Co.”
“We know that we’re very, very close to a few countries and are waiting to announce after we get the big, beautiful bill closed. And so I think you’re going to see a sequence of trade bills really starting from around the Fourth of July.”
The president threatened earlier Tuesday to yank recess next week if the sprawling tax cut and spending package is not on his desk. The Senate still has to approve the package, and then the House must give it a final stamp of approval, a pair of herculean tasks while there are still several lingering policy disagreements.
Trump’s 90-day pause on “reciprocal” tariffs on all trading partners expires July 8 with only agreements with China and the United Kingdom having been announced, despite the administration’s ambitious goals of 90 deals in 90 days.
When asked what is holding up trade deals, Hassett denied that there is an issue. The administration has insisted talks are progressing with trading partners like India, Japan and Vietnam but have not made any announcements.
Hassett mentioned a proposal, known as Section 899, in the House version of the megabill bill that could levy a 20 percent tax on foreign investors from countries that “discriminate” against the U.S.
“It’s just we’re doing things one at a time. An example … of like wanting to get all your ducks in a row is one of the nuances in the tax bill is something called 899, which is a thing that punishes foreign countries that have digital sales taxes and the like on us,” he said. “And we’ve been having constant negotiations as part of the trade deals for them to take those things off to stop treating our companies with their, quote, unquote, pillar two. And if they do that, that changes the bill.”
He added, “And so there’s still a lot of moving parts, but the parts are moving in a good direction.”
Trump detailed a trade deal with the United Kingdom last week, which was in the works before the president’s hefty tariffs were announced on trading partners. The U.S. and China also agreed to a deal that brought tariffs on Beijing to 55 percent.