If you annoy Trump, he can annoy you back equally, Howard Lutnick says

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, back in Washington after two days helping to negotiate a US-China trade framework in London, said Wednesday that Trump gave his team permission to back off its aggressive stance against China to get a deal done.

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, back in Washington after two days helping to negotiate a US-China trade framework in London, said Wednesday that Trump gave his team permission to back off its aggressive stance against China to get a deal done. Lutnick told CNBC in his first interview since the announcement of the US-China trade agreement late Tuesday night that after 25 hours of negotiations over two days with his Chinese counterparts, the world’s two largest economies are in a better place now after a series of escalations over the past month. Both countries, accusing one another of violating the terms of the previous deal agreed upon in Geneva last month, had increased export restrictions on various goods. “The Chinese had these rare-earth magnets and they were slow-rolling it. When they didn’t deliver the rare-earth magnets, we put on our countermeasures,” Lutnick said. “We were at mutual-assured annoyance.” He said the talks were respectful, without any yelling or screaming, and both countries believe the outcome was a win-win. “But we needed to make sure when they pulled out their card with these rare-earth magnets, we put in ours that said, ‘look you just can’t do that to America. America’s too great, too strong,’” Lutnick said. He said, for example, the Trump administration could have subpoenaed Chinese banks to open their records and “see all the things they had done wrong.” And he noted the White House placed curbs on ethane exports to China in retaliation.