Media: Biden will continue Trump's get-tough China policy

Thanks largely to its manufacturing base and massive trade deals, China and its Chinese Communist Party exist today as a world superpower that views the U.S. as its biggest obstacle to expanding military power in the South China Sea and financial power around the world.

With a new administration in the White House, Biden is expected to abandon what The Wall Street Journal calls Donald Trump’s “go-it-alone approach” to China and seek a “Summit of Democracies” to counter Beijing’s power and influence.

Meanwhile, China’s president, Xi Jinping, is a “step ahead” of President Biden and is wooing U.S. allies into what the Journal calls  the “economic orbit" of the world's second-largest economy. 

If the Biden administration is indeed ready to compete against China, that would differ from Biden's view of China during the presidential campaign. 

"China is going to eat our lunch? Come on, man,” Biden said during the Democratic primary, drawing criticism from both Republicans and his Democrat rivals for downplaying China's threat. 

During the campaign, American voters also watched revelations that Biden's son Hunter had made lucrative deals with China's shady businessmen, and a former business partner said Joe Biden personally benefitted from those business deals despite claiming otherwise. 

Mosher: China still recovering from Trump

Steven Mosher, president of the Population Research Institute, tells One News Now that he and other analysts predicted China’s massive economy and growing military would surpass the U.S. by 2016.

“Well, what happened?” Mosher recalls. “President Trump won the election in 2016. Mike Pompeo, Peter Navarro, they set back China's plan by a decade.”

Some analysts now predict China may surpass the U.S. by 2030, Mosher adds, but that prediction comes after the U.S. stood up to China’s communist leaders through tariffs; by sanctioning China’s high-tech companies; by openly supporting Taiwan and its military readiness; and by pushing back on China’s cyber theft, corporate theft, and domestic spying.

China and the U.S. have a delicate relationship, mostly tied to corporate board rooms, and tens of billions of dollars in manufacturing and trade, which benefits China more than the U.S. America’s trade with China totaled $634 billion in 2019, with a $345 billion trade deficit, according to the latest figures from the U.S. Trade Representative Office.

Despite the eye-popping trade numbers, China is the third largest trade partner with the U.S.

In an attempt to balance the trade deficit, Donald Trump announced tariffs against China. That action was predictably criticized by Big Business and Wall Street, but it also hurt U.S. farmers. In the Midwest, farmers were hurt after China retaliated with tariffs on soybeans, pork, and feed grains.

According to a second story about Biden’s plans for China, Fortune reports there is little difference between Trump and the new president:

Orders to rescind Trump tariffs on $350 billion worth of Chinese imports are conspicuously absent from Biden's ten-day policy blitz. Nor has Biden suggested any immediate interest in overturning Trump administration actions to delist Chinese telecommunications companies on the New York Stock Exchange, or ban Chinese apps, or blacklist Chinese technology companies.

Instead, the article said, mirroring the Wall Street Journal’s reporting, Biden plans a “multilateral approach” by wooing U.S. allies.

After meeting with China's president for the first time, Trump famously said Xi was looking out for his country's best interests but said he was doing the same for the U.S. with his "America First" policy.