Sen. James Lankford:
That was actually what I wanted to be able to ask the United States trade representative, several things. One is, is your goal to increase exports around the world? Because that’s what my farmers and ranchers, that’s what manufacturers really want to hear.
And the trade representative was very clear. Our goal is to increase exports around the world. Second one was, do we want to negotiate with these different countries where they had these very high tariffs and they’re coming? He was very clear to say, yes, we’re trying to negotiate these rates down much lower.
The third piece of that is really the piece that you’re trying to be able to ask about as well, is about the kind of the, what’s next on this? Where does this actually go on it? And what I hear from a lot of people is just tell me the timing because we don’t want to be cheated by other countries, but we need to know the timing for the next set of decisions.
They don’t have that timing yet, but they said they’re actively working on when they’re going to get negotiations complete, when they’re going to get the next step done, because those things really do matter in all the planning, but they’re actively working on it. And it was very clear the goal is to bring tariffs down and restrictions down around the world.
You’re right. We’re not going to have a trade balance with countries much poorer than us when we’re the largest economy in the world. But if they can get restrictions down that, even though that country is not buying as much, at least they’re allowing American products in, that does make a difference to us long term.
