The Port of Keelung in Taiwan. (Billy H.C. Kwok/Bloomberg News)
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Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the Trump administration’s agenda for trade agreements could get wrapped up by the Labor Day holiday, indicating some negotiations are likely to extend past the upcoming July deadline for elevated reciprocal tariffs.
“We have countries approaching us with very good deals,” Bessent said June 27 on Fox Business, highlighting Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick’s comments the day before that the White House has imminent plans to reach agreements with 10 major trading partners.
Bessent reiterated that there are 18 important trading partners, and noted that the U.S. has already done a deal with the U.K. and reached an accommodation with China, so those two “are behind us for now.”
“So if we can ink 10 or 12 of the important 18 — there are another important 20 relationships — then I think we could have trade wrapped up by Labor Day,” Bessent said. This year, Labor Day falls on Sept. 1. He didn’t specify the countries he expects deals with.
President Donald Trump put his April 2 “reciprocal” tariffs on American trading partners on pause for three months a week after declaring them, and that deadline looms July 9. Lutnick, speaking on Bloomberg Television on June 26, said that Trump was prepared to finalize a slate of trade deals in connection with that July time frame.
“We’re going to do top 10 deals, put them in the right category, and then these other countries will fit behind,” Lutnick said.
Trump and his advisers initially laid out ambitious plans for the negotiating period, suggesting concurrent talks with dozens of partners on reducing trade deficits, eliminating barriers to American goods and reshoring more manufacturing.
“We’ve got 90 deals in 90 days possibly pending here. And it was par for the course, actually it was a birdie for President Trump to do exactly what he did, which was pause for 90 days,” White House trade adviser Peter Navarro told NBC’s Meet the Press back in April. “We’re going to get this done for the American people.”
But that has not happened, as some trading partners have dug in on negotiations and with Trump indicating he would be willing to just unilaterally impose tariff levels if he was unhappy with the terms obtained in talks.
It is also unclear how comprehensive the trade deals the administration is moving to lock up will be. Such agreements can typically take years to negotiate. The pact with the U.K. that Trump has hailed as comprehensive still leaves critical points unresolved, and the China accord leaves open questions about fentanyl trafficking and U.S. exporters’ access to Chinese markets.
Earlier June 24, Trump suggested that India was one nation that could be close to finalizing a deal. A team of Indian trade officials was slated to hold meetings with officials in Washington this week.
