Trump Treasury Secretary Admits China Trade Deal Is Long Way Away

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent admitted that China isn’t budging in the face of President Trump’s ill-advised tariffs.

On Fox News Monday morning, Brian Kilmeade asked Bessent about progress on talks between the two countries over trade.

“Do you plan on calling your counterpart [in China]?” Kilmeade queried. Bessent’s response showed that he hadn’t planned on it.

“We will see what happens with China, uh, that it’s important, I think it’s unsustainable from the Chinese side, so, uh, maybe they’ll call me one day,” replied Bessent.

Meanwhile, China’s foreign ministry said Monday that President Xi Jinping and Trump have not spoken recently and that there hasn’t been any progress on a trade deal between the two countries, contradicting Trump’s words in Time magazine on Friday that Xi had called him as part of tariff negotiations.

“As far as I know, the two heads of state have not called each other recently,” said Guo Jiakun, a spokesperson for the ministry, to Reuters. “I would like to reiterate that China and the U.S. have not conducted consultations or negotiations on the tariffs issue.”

Trump has levied tariffs of 145 percent against China, inciting a trade war between the two countries as China retaliated with tariffs of its own. Trump toned down some of his anti-China rhetoric last week and even claimed that the two countries were working on a deal, only to be immediately corrected by Beijing then as well. It seems China knows that it has all of the leverage with U.S. markets sliding, and will dig in until Trump backs down.

Top GOP pollsters are seeing the forest for the trees in Donald Trump’s tanking approval rating.

Speaking with CNN on Sunday, Republican pollster and communications strategist Frank Luntz described the drop-off as “a significant change.”

An ABC News/Washington Post/Ipsos poll published Sunday found that Trump’s approval rating had plummeted to 39 percent—a 6 percent drop from February—while 55 percent of Americans said they disapprove of the job he’s doing in office. That’s the lowest first-100-day rating of a president since modern polling began, roughly 80 years ago.

“The president was upholding some reasonably high numbers—January, February, and early March. And over the tariff situation, it became more and more negative,” Luntz told CNN.

“The agenda still has a majority support,” Luntz continued. “But the way that it’s being articulated is costing the president right now.”

Trump’s whiplash tariff proposals turned the stock market—and Americans’ retirement savings—into a rollercoaster of losses. Still, Trump’s base is weathering the storm. The falling numbers are not stemming from his supporters, per Luntz, but rather a large chunk of the population who helped him secure the White House in November but would otherwise identify as nonpartisan.

“His own numbers, with his own people, have withstood all these pressures,” Luntz said. “It’s those who didn’t like him, now have really turned against him, and among independents, swing voters, people who are not ideological or partisan, those are the people who are saying, ‘I don’t like what’s happening right now.’”

“It’s not his own voters—and what the president and the administration will argue is that he’s just as popular today as he was with the people who voted for him. But in the end, we’re all of America, not just those who supported him.”

The pollster warned that Trump needs to change his messaging strategy on key issues or face the long-term consequences of his sinking popularity.

Donald Trump has completely gutted the Department of Justice section charged with securing elections, The Guardian reported Monday.

In January, there were seven top career managers overseeing the voting section of the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division, which is charged with enforcing federal laws protecting voter registration. As of this week, all of them are gone.

Last week, five of them were reassigned to the complaint adjudication office, which handles employee complaints, alongside Tamar Hagler, who had served as the chief of the voting section office, and another career attorney. Of the two remaining managers, one was reassigned to an antisemitism task force, and the other retired.

These removals are part of a wider reshuffling in the Justice Department, as experienced career officials are reassigned to low-level duties, shifted toward the priorities of the Trump administration, or elect to take buyouts.

Trump appointees at the DOJ also instructed career employees in the voting section to dismiss all remaining active cases, but did not provide a rationale for their dismissal and did not meet with the attorneys. The section’s final active case was dismissed last Monday.

“This is what you do when you don’t really know what the section does and just want to create chaos in the simplest way possible that doesn’t involve you reading anything,” one former voting section attorney told The Guardian. “It is extremely clear that the intent is to get absolutely nothing done. And the effect will be that absolutely nothing gets done.”

The moves come just weeks after Harmeet Dhillon was confirmed to lead the civil rights division. A staunch Trump ally, Dhillon defended several election deniers in court and was widely expected to go after civil rights and diversity achievements.

Trump’s demolition of the DOJ’s voting section represents a victory for election deniers and far-right groups.

Cleta Mitchell, a far-right activist with the ear of the president, called for “every lawyer in the Voting Section” to be “terminated” in a post on X after Trump was elected in November.

“They are not supportive of Pres Trump or MAGA. There has to be a reckoning. These are leftwing activists who have come from and should return to their leftwing organizations,” she wrote.

The American Accountability Foundation, a dark-money witch-hunting cadre, sent a letter to then–attorney general nominee Pam Bondi in December specifically asking her to gut the DOJ’s voting section.

“These people are woke radical leftists and donors who have no place in the Department of Justice,” the group wrote in the letter signed by Thomas Jones, AAF’s president. “In order to restore the American people’s trust in election integrity and a neutral civil service, they must be fired and replaced with America-first attorneys who will execute on the agenda the American People voted for in November.”

The Trump administration’s meddling at the Department of Justice is part of a wider scheme to undermine any election he is likely to lose. A federal judge ruled Thursday to block parts of Trump’s executive order last month attempting to overhaul elections and voting processes.

President Trump is expected to sign an executive order requiring all truck drivers to speak English, according to White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt.

“President Trump believes that English is a non-negotiable safety requirement for professional drivers, as they should be able to read and understand traffic signs, communicate with traffic safety officers, border patrol, agricultural checkpoints, and cargo weight-limit station personnel, and provide and receive feedback and directions in English,” a document given to Breitbart by the Trump administration reads.

The order directs Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy to “rescind and replace guidance to strengthen inspection procedures for compliance with English proficiency requirements.”

“To promote unity, cultivate a shared American culture for all citizens, ensure consistency in government operations, and create a pathway to civic engagement, it is in America’s best interest for the Federal Government to designate one—and only one—official language,” the order continues. “Establishing English as the official language will not only streamline communication but also reinforce shared national values, and create a more cohesive and efficient society.”

Trump is expected to sign the order at 5 p.m. on Monday.

This comes days after Oklahoma advanced and Arkansas passed similar acts targeting non-English speaking drivers. This act, a clear shot at immigrant truck workers inspired by a MAGA conspiracy theory about an influx of foreign truck drivers, could very well have adverse effects on an industry that is the lifeblood of the country’s domestic shipping industry.

Trump supporters are freaking out after Illinois Governor JB Pritzker called for mass mobilization to resist Donald Trump.

Pritzker told guests at a New Hampshire dinner full of Democratic activists, officials, and donors on Sunday, “It’s time to fight everywhere and all at once.”

“Never before in my life have I called for mass protests, for mobilization, for disruption. But I am now. These Republicans cannot know a moment of peace,” the Democratic governor said, drawing applause and even standing ovations from those in attendance. 

This did not sit well in Trumpworld. The president’s supporters immediately started clutching their pearls and acting as if Pritzker called for mass anarchy. Tech oligarch and fascism enthusiast Elon Musk called the remarks “crazy” on his X account, reposting video from the “End Wokeness” account, which is likely run by right-wing influencer Jack Posobiec.

Fellow MAGA influencer Benny Johnson accused Pritzker of inciting violence.  

Douglass Mackey, who went to prison for interfering in the 2016 election, went even further, claiming that Pritzker was “essentially calling for civil war against MAGA.”

Catturd, a well-known MAGA online troll whose real name is Phillip Buchanan, called Pritzker “scum.” 

This public freakout over a simple call to activism shows how the right is frightened of even the smallest bit of protest and seeks to criminalize any dissenting speech. MAGA personalities, such as Kari Lake, regularly call for and celebrate political violence, especially when a court case or election doesn’t go their way (and even when it does).  Even Republicans have admitted they’re terrified of the MAGA base’s threats of violence.

Pritzker’s words are much tamer than what conservatives say on a regular basis and are what Democratic voters are looking to hear from their leaders. It seems that the real conservative freakout might be fear over a coming wave of opposition in this country that could result in a loss of power and influence.