Trump threatens to reignite trade war with China, citing Beijing’s rare earth move

President Donald Trump on Friday threatened to impose “massive” new tariffs on China and to cancel an upcoming summit meeting with President Xi Jinping in response to Beijing’s latest move to restrict exports of rare earth magnets and raw materials.

“This was a real surprise, not only to me, but to all the Leaders of the Free World,” Trump said in a lengthy post on Truth Social. “I was to meet President Xi in two weeks, at APEC, in South Korea, but now there seems to be no reason to do so.”

Trump said the United States was still weighing how to respond, but said further tariffs were an option.

“One of the Policies that we are calculating at this moment is a massive increase of Tariffs on Chinese products coming into the United States of America. There are many other countermeasures that are, likewise, under serious consideration,” Trump wrote.

The United States already has tariffs averaging about 55 percent on Chinese goods. That includes a 10 percent reciprocal rate, a 20 percent duty linked to U.S. concerns about fentanyl trafficking and additional tariffs imposed during Trump’s first term.

In his Truth Social post, Trump wrote China had been sending letters to countries throughout the world informing them of plans to restrict exports “of each and every element of production having to do with Rare Earths, and virtually anything else they can think of, even if it’s not manufactured in China.”

“Nobody has ever seen anything like this but, essentially, it would ‘clog’ the Markets, and make life difficult for virtually every Country in the World, especially for China. We have been contacted by other Countries who are extremely angry at this great Trade hostility, which came out of nowhere,” Trump wrote.

China should not be allowed to exert “monopoly” power over the exports of rare earth magnets, which are used in a number of high-tech, green energy and medical goods, Trump continued.

But if Beijing follows that course, “the U.S. has Monopoly positions also, much stronger and more far reaching than China’s,” he added.

The Chinese Embassy didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.

Trump’s Truth Social post could mark the decisive end to a fragile trade truce that the U.S. and China have sustained since May as their negotiators have pursued a deal aimed at addressing the United States’ massive trade imbalance with China and other longtime irritants.

It also suggests that Beijing’s tightening grip on its critical mineral supply has derailed the White House strategy of reducing trade frictions in the run-up to the long-anticipated meeting between Trump and Xi later this month.

“This week's export-control expansion looks like a miscalculation — what Beijing sees as leverage, Washington views as betrayal,” said Craig Singleton, senior China fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. “Trump’s statement shows that even a deal-driven White House has limits, and China may have just crossed them.”

“But the risk is clear,” Singleton continued. “Mutually assured disruption is no longer a metaphor. Both sides are reaching for their economic weapons at the same time, and neither seems willing to back down."

Earlier this year, Trump hiked his reciprocal tariff on China up to 125 percent, which Beijing matched in a series of tit-for-tat moves resulting in a virtual embargo on each other’s goods. That led to a meeting in May where the two sides agreed to scale back their tariffs for 90 days while talks continued.

The two sides agreed in August to extend the reduced tariff rates for another 90 days, raising the stakes for the upcoming Xi-Trump meeting that has been expected to take place just before the annual APEC leaders meeting on Oct. 31-Nov. 1.

Trump’s trade moves have already significantly reduced trade with China, which was the United States’ third largest trading partner in 2024.

U.S. imports from the Asian heavyweight totaled $194 billion in the first seven months of 2025, compared to $239 billion in the same period last year. U.S. exports to China in January through July totaled $65 billion, compared to $82 billion in the same seven months in 2024.

U.S. exports of agricultural products, particularly soybeans, to China have been hit particularly hard, prompting the Trump administration to consider ways to provide billions of dollars of subsidy payments to farmers.

Phelim Kine contributed to this report.