Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba is forming a team to forge a tariff deal with U.S. President Donald Trump after the two spoke by phone on Monday, following one of the worst days for Tokyo stocks in recent memory. But behind the scenes, Ishiba has been saying that he doesn’t know who he needs to speak with in order to talk sense to his U.S. counterpart.
It’s not hard to see why, given recent remarks from the American side. Just take one example of Trump’s comments on a favored topic: auto sales.
"Toyota sells 1 million foreign-made automobiles into the United States and General Motors sells almost none” in Japan in return, Trump said last week, laying out his tariff regime. "Ford sells very little. None of our companies are allowed to go into other countries,” he added, blasting "nonmonetary restrictions” that Tokyo and others supposedly impose. After speaking to Ishiba, Trump reiterated the point in a post on Truth Social, saying that "They don’t take our cars, but we take MILLIONS of theirs!”
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