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China warns Iowa soybean farmers of ‘a president’s folly’

Advertising supplement in state’s largest newspaper warns soybean farmers of the impact of the trade war

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Chinese President Xi Jinping shown during a visit to Iowa in 2012, a visit an advertising supplement in Sunday’s Des Moines Register highlighted as Xi’s “fun days in Iowa”. Photo: Reuters

China reached into the US heartland in its escalating trade war over President Donald Trump’s tariffs, using an advertising supplement in Iowa’s largest newspaper to highlight the impact on the state’s soybean farmers as “the fruit of a president’s folly’’.

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The four-page section in Sunday’s Des Moines Register, which carried the label “paid for and prepared solely by China Daily, an official publication of the People’s Republic of China,” featured articles including one outlining how the trade dispute is forcing Chinese importers to turn to South America instead of the US for soybeans.

“Pretty savvy political play being run by China,’’ Tommy Vietor, a former national security spokesman for President Barack Obama, said on Twitter about the tactic.

Xi with then Iowa Governor Terry Branstad, second from left, in Maxwell, Iowa, in 2012. Branstad is now the US ambassador to China. Photo: Reuters
Xi with then Iowa Governor Terry Branstad, second from left, in Maxwell, Iowa, in 2012. Branstad is now the US ambassador to China. Photo: Reuters

The advertising targets a state critical to Trump and Republicans at a time the trade war between the world’s two largest economies is intensifying. The US is imposing tariffs on an additional US$200 billion in Chinese imports starting Monday, on top of the US$50 billion in goods already hit with levies.

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Meanwhile, US$110 billion of goods from the US will become subject to Chinese retaliatory tariffs around the same time.

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