‘He likes the game too much’: Why Trump isn’t sweating his lack of trade deals

The White House has little to show as President Donald Trump’s self-imposed deadline to reach trade deals with dozens of countries arrives in four days. Trump bragged he would rapidly secure dozens of trade deals, but his administration has claimed just three — and the details are thin.

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Mark DiPlacido, who worked in the U.S. Trade Representative’s Office during Trump’s first term, said he believes Trump will use the threat of unilateral tariffs up until the deadline. But, at the end of the day, Trump wants deals, he said.

“I think the president hopes to reach a deal and get the concessions that he wants to see from these countries — and is willing to walk away or willing to suspend negotiations to get those concessions,” said DiPlacido, now a policy advisor at American Compass, a think tank that embraces economic populism. “But at the end of the day, in most cases, he wants an actual deal. If it were just punitive, there wouldn’t have been the 90-day extension.”