President Donald Trump said Thursday that he doubts high-stakes trade negotiations with China will succeed.
"Will that be successful? I tend to doubt it," the president told reporters during an appearance with NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg. "The reason I doubt it is because China has become very spoiled. The European Union has become very spoiled. Other countries have become very spoiled, because they always got 100 percent of whatever they wanted from the United States."
"But we can't allow that to happen anymore," Trump added.
A Chinese delegation is currently in Washington taking part in talks with top Trump administration officials. The meetings follow a separate round of negotiations in Beijing earlier in the month.
The U.S. and China hope to bring down escalating tensions that threaten to start a trade war and damage the world's two largest economies. U.S. stock markets dipped after Trump's comments Thursday, as traders and investors hope talks will avoid major tariffs proposed by both countries.
Tensions within the Trump administration have threatened to complicate this week's talks. Peter Navarro, Trump's trade advisor and a China hawk, and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin have bumped heads recently.
Navarro has sought a tough response to China, which has led him to disagree with some colleagues in the Trump administration.
Chinese Vice Premier Liu He, Xi's top economic advisor, told U.S. lawmakers Wednesday that he planned to work hard to address the countries' trade imbalance and other trade issues.
Reference: CNBC
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