Donald Trump says US reconsiders ZTE penalties as favour to Xi Jinping
Congressional opposition grows even as Trump says he would ‘envision’ a revised penalty for the telecoms company
US President Donald Trump said on Tuesday that he is doing Chinese President Xi Jinping a favour by reconsidering the penalties on Chinese telecommunications equipment maker ZTE Corp, but that no deal has been reached yet to alleviate the sanctions on the company.
Trump told reporters at the White House that Xi had asked him to look into the ZTE issue and that he was.
“The media misreported stories about ZTE,” Trump said. Various deals are being discussed, he added. For now, "there is no deal. We will see what happens," Trump said.
Opposition to Trump’s move to review the ZTE case was building on Capitol Hill. On Tuesday, a Senate panel overwhelmingly supported an amendment to block the removal of penalties on ZTE.
In a separate bipartisan letter Tuesday, 27 senators urged the White House “not to compromise lawful U.S. enforcement actions against serial and pre-meditated violators of US law, such as ZTE.”