Fresh off this weekend’s agreement for a pause in the tariff war between the US and China, President Trump touted the accomplishment and said he believes he can work with China’s Xi Jinping and Russia’s Vladimir Putin to curb the nuclear arms race.
“I am certain that, at some time in the future, President Xi and I, together with President Putin of Russia, will start talking about a meaningful halt to what has become a major and uncontrollable Arms Race,” Trump wrote on his Twitter account on Monday. “The U.S. spent 716 Billion Dollars this year. Crazy!”
Trump and Xi agreed to a 90-day ceasefire on imposing new tariffs during a meeting between the two leaders at the G-20 summit in Argentina on Saturday.
China, as part of the deal, will buy agricultural, energy and industrial products from the US “to reduce the trade imbalance between our two countries,” the White House said in a statement.
In two tweets earlier Monday, Trump praised his relationship with Xi and said the agreement he brokered with the Chinese leader will help people in America’s breadbasket hurt by China’s targeting soybeans of with a 25 percent tariff.
“Farmers will be a very BIG and FAST beneficiary of our deal with China. They intend to start purchasing agricultural product immediately. We make the finest and cleanest product in the World, and that is what China wants. Farmers, I LOVE YOU!,” Trump wrote.
In another posting, Trump boasted about his can-do relationship with Xi.
“President Xi and I have a very strong and personal relationship. He and I are the only two people that can bring about massive and very positive change, on trade and far beyond, between our two great Nations,” Trump wrote. “A solution for North Korea is a great thing for China and ALL!”
The US defense spending bill includes $716 billion for national security to expand the country’s nuclear arsenal and counter Russian influence in Europe and China’s expansion.
But Trump was criticized in October after he announced that he would withdraw from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty that the US and Russia inked during the Cold War.
The INF deal signed by President Ronald Reagan and Soviet Union leader Mikhail Gorbachev in 1987 eliminated a whole class of nuclear weapons.
Trump claimed Russia violated the agreement and said China doesn’t have to abide by it.
