Trump’s Asia-Bound With China Trade At Stake: Starting Line

Trump Heads To Asia

Talk about setting a high bar. Ahead of his trip to Malaysia, Japan, and South Korea to meet with foreign leaders — crucially including Chinese leader Xi Jinping — President Donald Trump told reporters, “We’ll make a deal on, I think, everything.”

Everything covers a lot of ground.

As Jennifer A. Dlouhy and Josh Wingrove report, Trump wants China to resume buying American soybeans; crack down on fentanyl; and back off restrictions on rare-earth exports.

In exchange, he could keep higher tariffs on Chinese goods on pause.

Trump also has talked about a possible nuclear weapons agreement, and expressed a desire to convince Xi to pressure Russian President Vladimir Putin to end his invasion of Ukraine.

And some China hawks will be watching for any signs of change in US policy toward Taiwan. China has asked the White House to officially declare it “opposes” Taiwanese independence. Taiwan probably is “the apple of his eye,” Trump said of Xi earlier this week. Read More

In this hemisphere, Trump announced he was terminating trade negotiations with Canada because of a TV ad Ontario is running featuring the voice of former President Ronald Reagan criticizing tariffs. Officials from both countries have been engaged in lengthy talks for months, most recently focused on steel and aluminum tariffs. Read More

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Redistricting Surprise

The redistricting dominoes that Trump tipped over when he pressed Texas and other states to create more Republican-tilting congressional seats will cascade some more next week.

Virginia lawmakers are convening a special session on Monday to consider a constitutional amendment — the first step toward majority Democrats’ goal of countering GOP gerrymanders with one of their own. Things are moving fast in Richmond to meet a requirement for passage in two separate legislative sessions with an intervening election. To pull that off the first vote would have to happen before Nov. 4, which is right around the corner.

Virginians also are electing a governor on Nov. 4, so the whole gambit only works if voters choose someone who’s willing to sign a redistricting bill and call a special election on the proposed constitutional amendment — so lots to watch there. Read More

Elsewhere:

Today’s scheduled to bring part two of an evidentiary hearing in Utah’s redistricting litigation;
Ohio’s redistricting commission has an Oct. 31 deadline to either to pass a bipartisan map or punt line-drawing to the legislature;
It’s the home stretch for the campaign in California asking voters to adopt a constitutional amendment that would let them counter the Republican gerrymanders in Texas, Missouri, and North Carolina.

Crucial Dates Approach

It’s Shutdown Day No. 24, and the stalemate shows every sign of continuing into next week.

Democrats continue to demand help for people about to get hit with higher premiums when temporary Obamacare subsidy boosts expire. Republicans continue to insist that negotiations have to wait until the government’s open. Plus, the House’s month-plus absence appears likely to continue.

As Ken Tran reports in this morning’s BGOV Budget, Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said there’s no reason to vote on bills to ease the shutdown’s impact. “If I brought everybody back right now and we voted on a measure to do this, to pay essential workers, it would be spiked in the Senate,” he said. “It would be a waste of our time, and it would take the pressure off Chuck Schumer to get his job done and open the government again.”

In another week, the pain points will become more numerous. Air traffic controllers and other federal workers in roles deemed essential won’t be paid. Open enrollment in health insurance plans begins a week from tomorrow. That’s also when SNAP benefit cards are supposed to reload.

Senate Appropriations Chair Susan Collins (R-Maine) told reporters she’s been in conversations with the administration to potentially release contingency funds so the hungriest Americans can use their SNAP cards to buy food. Skye Witley explains more in a BGOV video.

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Next Week On the Hill

Despite the shutdown stalemate, it should be easy to find minority-party House members. Maeve Sheehey reports that Democrats have been told to show up next week.

They plan to caucus in person on Tuesday, which is a switch after leaders urged them to use the schedule lapse to meet with constituents and hold town halls this week. Read More

The Senate side of the Hill will be active again next week, including with an Indian Affairs Committee hearing set for Wednesday on the impact the federal funding pause is having on native communities.

And the debate over how social media can spread unpopular, false, or hateful speech moves to a hearing room that day. The Senate Commerce Committee is bringing in executives from Google and Meta to testify about government pressure to moderate content.

Eye on Interest Rates

The Federal Reserve is on track to cut interest rates again at next week’s meeting. In their public comments, the policy makers have signaled that though they’re reluctant to goose inflation, they’re also worried about jobs.

“You’re at a place where further declines in job openings might very well show up in unemployment,” Fed Chair Jerome Powell told an economics conference last week.

One factor to watch: The role of inflation figures for September, which were delayed by the shutdown and are due to be released today.

The Federal Open Markets Committee meets Tuesday and Wednesday, concluding with the interest-rate vote and a press conference, where all ears will be on what Powell has to say about the pace of potential further cuts in the benchmark interest rate.

Before You Go

Standing Down: Trump said he’s calling off the deployment of federal troops to San Francisco after speaking to billionaires Marc Benioff and Jensen Huang, as well as the city’s mayor, Daniel Lurie. “Friends of mine who live in the area called last night to ask me not to go forward with the surge,” Trump said on social media, specifically naming Benioff and Huang. “Therefore, we will not surge San Francisco on Saturday.” Read More

Under the Sea: The Trump administration is readying a proposal to open almost all US coastal waters to new offshore oil drilling, Jennifer A. Dlouhy reports. The plans are being made despite opposition from state governors and the president’s previous efforts to close off some of the territory. Read More

Data Centers: The Trump administration is pushing regulators to dramatically accelerate the process of allowing the booming data-center sector to connect to power grids. Energy Secretary Chris Wright urged the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission yesterday to grant expedited reviews for data-center grid connections, Dlouhy and Naureen S. Malik report. Read More

Pal Pardoned: A crypto businessman who helped the Trump family with the launch of its stablecoin has received a presidential pardon. Binance co-founder Changpeng Zhao had pleaded guilty in 2023 to failing to maintain an effective anti-money-laundering program. His exchange facilitated transactions for the military wing of Hamas, hackers and money launderers. Read More

Booming Business: Taking a close look at how a federal set-aside for “socially and economically disadvantaged” communities has morphed into a large enterprise, Polly Mosendz, Michael Smith, and Rachel Adams-Heard report on Alaska’s Nana Regional Corp., which manages or provides security services to detention facilities. Read More

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To contact the reporter on this story: Katherine Rizzo in Washington at krizzo@bgov.com

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Keith Perine at kperine@bloomberglaw.com; Herb Jackson at hjackson@bloombergindustry.com

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