Victor Davis Hanson: Trump Scared China Into Playing ‘Nice’ With the US Again

The Daily Signal

News, Government, Politics, Daily News

4.6 • 1.2K Ratings

🗓️ 6 November 2025

⏱️ 10 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

The “experts” were wrong again. For months, Americans were told that the U.S. was embroiled in a losing “trade war” with China, preventing the two world powers from striking any sort of deal. However, in the face of this supposed adversity, Chinese leader Xi Jinping and President Donald Trump inked a trade and economic deal, which included key Chinese concessions: agreeing to buy more U.S. soybeans, ease export controls on rare earth minerals, and crack down on fentanyl production chemicals. “In other words, China is trying to be nice to us because it's afraid. Because it understands that the United States always had the potential, as a free, consensual society, to be more dynamic, stronger, and have a much greater role in the world” and that the only thing holding us back was Joe Biden’s ineffectual leadership, argues Victor Davis Hanson on today’s edition of “Victor Davis Hanson: In His Own Words.” 👉 This episode is sponsored by the Pepperdine School of Public Policy. Learn more: ⁠https://go.pepperdine.edu/dailysignal⁠ 👉Don’t miss out on Victor’s latest short videos by subscribing to The Daily Signal today. You’ll be notified every time a new piece of content drops: ⁠https://www.youtube.com/dailysignal?sub_confirmation=1⁠ Also on Spotify: https://megaphone.link/THEDAILYSIGNAL9753340027 👉Want more VDH? Watch Victor’s weekly, hour-long podcast, “Victor Davis Hanson: In His Own Words,” now! Subscribe to his YouTube channel, and enable notifications: https://www.youtube.com/@victordavishanson7273?sub_confirmation=1 👉More exclusive content is available on Victor’s website: https://victorhanson.com 👉The Daily Signal cannot continue to tell stories, like this one, without the support of our viewers: ⁠https://secured.dailysignal.com/⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Ready to launch your business? Get started with the commerce platform made for entrepreneurs.
0:04.8	Shopify is specially designed to help you start, run and grow your business with easy customizable
0:10.4	themes that let you build your brand, marketing tools that get your products out there.
0:14.7	Integrated shipping solutions that actually save you time. From startups to scaleups, online,
0:20.1	in person and on the go. Shopify is made for
0:22.8	entrepreneurs like you. Sign up for your $1 a month trial at Shopify.com slash setup.
0:30.0	Donald Trump just met recently with Chinese leader Chi Jingping. They were trying to resolve the
0:36.0	growing tensions over trade and tariffs.
0:38.7	The United States did pretty well. We agreed to lower tariffs. They're still going to be
0:43.2	nominally 47 percent on incoming Chinese goods, but China in return is going to drop tariffs
0:49.9	against us. It's going to buy U.S. soybeans, and it's going to stop its blockade or embargo of
0:56.7	rare earth materials. And so there was a give and take. But the question I have is why now,
1:02.4	after all of this rhetoric of resistance, why is it willing to even talk to Donald Trump? I thought
1:07.9	we were going to be in a trade war. I thought China was winning. The answer is that I guess Donald Trump exposed China for what it is.
1:14.9	Hello, this is Victor Davis Hanson for The Daily Signal. Donald Trump just met recently with
1:30.6	Chinese leader Chi Jing Ping, and they had a mini-summit of sorts, not a long one, but they
1:37.7	were trying to resolve the growing tensions over trade and tariffs. And we'll let the analysts and the pundits sort out who won or who
1:47.6	lost. But I think most people feel the United States did pretty well. In other words, although we
1:53.4	agreed to lower tariffs, they're still going to be nominally 47 percent on incoming Chinese goods,
2:00.3	maybe smaller or less severe in certain areas.
2:04.1	But China in return is going to drop tariffs against us, restrictions about sending things into China,
2:13.0	buying U.S. it's going to buy U.S. soybeans, and it's going to stop its blockade or embargo of
	...

Transcript will be available on the free plan in 2 days. Upgrade to see the full transcript now.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Daily Signal, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of The Daily Signal and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.