Trump’s JD Vance problem is now China’s, too

Chinese leader Xi Jinping can’t be happy his Third Plenum extravaganza is competing for headlines with events 11,000 kilometers from Beijing.

In Xi’s defense, it’s hard to compete for headlines with an assassination attempt against former US President Donald Trump half a world away. That, coming just over two weeks after Trump’s fiery debate with a cognitively challenged President Joe Biden.

But Trump’s choice of JD Vance as his running mate could signal an even bigger upstaging of Xi’s grandest economic plans going forward.

US elections rarely, if ever, turn on VP picks. And Vance, a first-term senator from Ohio, is more Trump “mini me” than a running mate who might expand the ticket’s appeal. Yet Vance is an important messaging pick – signaling a doubling down on Trumpism’s worst instincts.

And it could be bad news for hopes that in a second term, Trump might be more transactional with China than confrontational.

Granted, this was always a long shot. But officials in Tokyo have been losing sleep over the prospect of Trump doing a “grand bargain” trade deal with Xi that leaves other top Asia economies looking in from the outside.

It’s anyone’s guess what having China-hawk Vance – who’s all-in on revoking Beijing’s “most-favored nation” status – whispering in the president’s ear might mean for a Trump 2.0 presidency. At the very least, it suggests Trump’s 60% tariff is just the start of broader efforts to Make Trade Wars Great Again.

The collateral damage could be unprecedented. UBS Group AG thinks this tax alone would cut China’s annual growth by more than half – lopping 2.5 percentage points off the gross domestic product of Asia’s biggest economy. China grew just 4.7% in the first quarter amid weak retail spending,