Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said China is “playing with a pair of twos,” but Chinese officials fired back: “All bullies are just paper tigers.”
Despite President Donald Trump’s confidence that China would “beg for mercy” under massive new tariffs, Beijing has met the pressure with defiance.
Following Trump’s April decision to impose combined taxes of 145% on Chinese imports, China retaliated with triple-digit tariffs of its own.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said China is “playing with a pair of twos,” but Chinese officials fired back: “All bullies are just paper tigers.”
Trump’s top negotiators, Bessent and U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer, head to Geneva this weekend for early-stage trade talks. Trump hinted at a potential tariff rollback, saying “80% Tariff seems right! Up to Scott.”
Analysts warn that the talks face long odds. “There’s no shared roadmap,” said Craig Singleton of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.
The standoff has rattled global markets and inflamed U.S. businesses facing rising costs. “This was not very well planned,” said CFR’s Zongyuan Zoe Liu.
Both nations appear locked in a high-stakes economic showdown.