Washington:
President-elect Joe Biden plans to name China specialist Katherine Tai to serve as the nation’s major trade negotiator, US media reported Wednesday.
Tai will replace Robert Lighthizer as US Trade Representative (USTR) in the new administration, according to the reports citing individuals familiar with the matter.
The selection puts an seasoned trade lawyer on the frontline of repairing relations with US trading partners that have been upended by President Donald Trump’s aggressive “America first” policy, which incorporated a damaging trade war with China.
She would be the very first Asian-American and the fourth lady to serve in the cabinet-level function.
Tai, a graduate of Yale and Harvard Law, at present functions as the chief trade lawyer for the House Ways and Means Committee, but previously served in the workplace of the USTR basic counsel exactly where she handled China trade concerns.
Legislators of each parties, impressed by Tai’s work in Congress on the USMCA no cost trade pact with Canada and Mexico, had advised her for the post, Politico reported.
Progressive Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio known as Tai “the most qualified candidate for USTR.”
“Tai played a critical role in securing real improvements for workers in the USMCA agreement last year,” he mentioned on Twitter.
In addition to the China trade policy, which Biden has vowed to leave unchanged in his very first months in workplace, Tai would oversee the USMCA, a huge dispute with the European Union more than Boeing and Airbus as effectively as myriad other squabbles like more than steel and aluminum.
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