Trump Predicts China Will Resume Buying US Soybeans
President Says He Will Put Pressure on Xi at Upcoming Meeting
[Stay on top of transportation news: .]
President Donald Trump predicted China would resume purchases of American soybeans after meeting President Xi Jinping, though a cabinet official said federal relief for beleaguered farmers will have to wait until the government reopens.
Trump said Oct. 9 that the pressure he would put on the Chinese president during their planned sit-down later this month would end Beijing’s monthslong moratorium on U.S. soybean buys.
RELATED: Farmers Urge Trump to Secure Soybean Trade With China
“What happens with soybeans is we’re going to see more and more, I think, opening up,” Trump told reporters at the White House. “He’s got things that he wants to discuss with me, and I have things that I want to discuss with him. And one of the things is soybeans.”
DZԲ
The Trump administration for weeks has teased a forthcoming aid program for farmers as a way to provide temporary assistance until market conditions improve, but Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins signaled that a package won’t be announced as long as the government funding lapse continues.
“We’ve got to get the government reopened so that we can move forward on that, and once we do, we’ll be able to move out a significant program to help our farmers long term,” she said during a Cabinet meeting at the White House.
Farming communities, which voted overwhelmingly for Trump in the 2024 election, have been crushed as export markets have dried up and many federal safety net programs have shrunk during his second term, in which the president has waged a trade war on virtually all U.S. trading partners.
The refusal to buy American soybeans by China, the world’s largest importer of the crop, has hit farmers particularly hard. Despite the U.S.-China trade truce, Beijing has turned to other exporters, including Brazil and Argentina, for its supplies. Trump has claimed the move is a negotiating tactic in broader trade talks.
Trump threatened to bring some of his own leverage to bear when he sees Xi on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit. Trump suggested he might restrict the sale of certain products to China, without offering specifics, when asked about reports Beijing is pursuing new curbs on its rare earths.
Want more news? Listen to today's daily briefing above or go here for more info
“We have the ultimate export. We have import and we have export. We import from China massive amounts. And, you know, maybe we’ll have to stop doing that, but I don’t know exactly what it is. Neither do you. Neither does anybody,” the president told reporters.
He said Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick would work on the issue. It was unclear what exports the president was referring to.
The Trump administration is considering whether to take steps to restrict the U.S. operations of TP-Link Systems, a China-linked router provider popular in the American market, according to people familiar with the matter.
