President Donald Trump told a gathering of business leaders in Tokyo that Japan has an unfair advantage on trade and that he intends to fix that imbalance by making it easier to do business in the U.S.
"For the last many decades, Japan has been winning. You do know that," he said Monday. "Right now our trade with Japan is not fair and it isn’t open."
Trump laid out his complaints about how Japan treats the U.S. unfairly in his eyes, noting that few American cars are sold in Japan and making a plea for Japanese automakers to build more in the U.S.
“Try building your cars in the United States instead of shipping them over. That’s not too much to ask," Trump said. "Is that rude to ask?”
The $69 billion trade deficit with Japan is the second-highest for the U.S., behind only China, and fueled largely by American imports of cars and electronics.
White House officials say they’re eager to recruit more Japanese companies to hire American workers. Japanese companies currently employ around 850,000 U.S. workers -- a number Trump is hoping to grow -- with automakers like Toyota Motor Corp. and Honda Motor Co. already having sizable plants in the U.S.
TPP Hurdle
That effort may be hampered by Trump’s decision on entering office to withdraw from the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a 12-nation free trade agreement. Japanese officials are still stinging from the decision, and have said they’re eager to either negotiate a bilateral trade deal with the U.S. or win Trump back to the multinational agreement -- which seemed unlikely in light of Trump’s defense of his pullout from the pact.
"TPP was not the right idea. I’m sure some of you in this room disagree, but ultimately I’ll be proven right," Trump said.
He said he envisions easing trade restrictions in another way, outside the TPP framework, but offered few details beyond saying that he personally had the power to speed business deals that had been hung up in the past.
He cited the Keystone and Dakota pipelines that he been held up under the Obama administration. "In my first week, I approved both," Trump said.
Trump also took credit for recent record stock market highs and an addition 2 million workers in the workforce, saying: "I’ve reduced regulations terrifically if I do say so myself."
‘Act of Evil’
Ahead of the speech, Trump addressed the church shooting in Texas that killed at least 26 people, calling it an "act of evil" and pledging his administration’s full support to state authorities.
“We cannot put into words the pain and grief we all feel, and we cannot begin to imagine the suffering” of those affected, Trump said.
Following his meeting with business leaders, Trump is expected to meet with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe for discussions on the progress of an economic dialogue undertaken by Vice President Mike Pence and Japanese Deputy Prime Minister Taro Aso.
Those talks have largely focused on differences with currency and trade, with the U.S. pushing to lower agricultural tariffs and restrictions on American car sales in Japan. American negotiators are pushing for Japan to remove a safeguard mechanism on imports of U.S. frozen beef that have increased tariffs to 50 percent from 38.5 percent.
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