Gina Raimondo, the secretary of commerce, is heading to China on Saturday with two seemingly contradictory responsibilities: a mandate to strengthen U.S. business relations with Beijing while also imposing some of the toughest Chinese trade restrictions in years.
The head of the Commerce Department is traditionally the government’s biggest champion for the business community both at home and abroad, promoting the kind of extensive ties U.S. firms have with China, the world’s second-largest economy.
But U.S.-China relations have turned chillier as China has become more aggressive in flexing its economic and military might. While China remains an important economic partner, American officials have increasingly viewed the country as a security threat and have imposed a raft of new restrictions aimed at crippling Beijing’s access to technology that could be used to strengthen the Chinese military or security services.
The bulk of those restrictions — which have stoked anger and irritation from the Chinese government — have been imposed by Ms. Raimondo’s agency.
The Commerce Department has issued extensive trade restrictions on sales of chips, software and machinery to China’s semiconductor industry and is mulling an expansion of those rules that could be issued soon after Ms. Raimondo returns to Washington.
Her visit could be the biggest test yet of whether the Biden administration can pull off the balancing act of promoting economic ties with China while clamping down on some trade in the interest of national security.
Ms. Raimondo will be the fourth administration official to travel to China in recent months, following John Kerry, the president’s special envoy for climate change; Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen; and Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken.
Ms. Raimondo is expected to reiterate what her counterparts have told Chinese officials: that there is no contradiction between the administration’s goals for encouraging commercial engagement with China and protecting U.S. national security. They argue that the United States can maintain economic ties with China that benefit both countries and encourage peace, while also setting narrow but tough restrictions on China’s access to advanced technology in the interest of national defense.
But the approach faces skepticism in both countries. In the United States, some Republicans argue that even more innocuous business ties with China could undercut U.S. industries and leave the nation vulnerable to influence from Beijing. And in China, many view what the U.S. government describes as narrow, national-security-related actions as a poorly disguised effort to hold back the Chinese economy.
“I think the Commerce Department has tried to be very targeted,” said Samm Sacks, a senior fellow at Yale Law School’s Paul Tsai China Center. “Now, the Chinese side won’t see it that way.”
For Chinese officials, Ms. Raimondo simultaneously represents some of their best opportunities for…
2023-08-26 02:00:31
Article from www.nytimes.com
rnrn