SECRETARY RUBIO: You guys don't look nearly as excited to see me as the foreign press briefing. (Laughter.) I'm going to spend more time with them. Which way am I facing, this way? It's been - this has been really good. I mean, we've had really great interactions, very positive - everyone's been very positive and enthusiastic. Obviously, the issue of trade comes up. But as I remind everybody, there's no country in the world that I can meet with right now where the issue of trade and tariffs wouldn't come up, because this is a global action.
So our negotiators, the baseline will take effect the 1st of August, but obviously, as the President's made clear, there are opportunities for adjustments based on arrangements that could be made between now and then. But beyond that, it's been very positive; all of our engagements here have been very positive. We've been very warmly received, and everyone's excited we're here and excited about the opportunities to work together on a number of things. We'll have even a few more announcements to make about some elevation of strategic partnerships. Obviously the Memorandum of Understanding we signed yesterday was very positive with the host country. They did a great job hosting this, by the way. This has been a great forum to be able to interact with a lot of different countries, and hopefully to take back some potential decisions that can be made that further strengthen our commitment to this part of the world.
As I pointed out today on two occasions during our interventions and opportunity to speak, the United States is a Pacific nation - not just the mainland of the United States that faces the Pacific, but we have American citizens, and one of our 50 states. We have - the United States is the number one source of foreign direct investment in Southeast Asia. We're not abandoning any of that nor are we abandoning these strong bilateral ties that we have with many of these countries, some of which go back decades and decades. In fact, today is the 30th anniversary of U.S. diplomatic relations with Vietnam, and think about how far that relationship has come. We had a very positive meeting today, and with the Vietnamese, as an example, and we're looking forward to building on - continue to build on that relationship, which is both deeply symbolic given how far our two countries have come, but also we have very exciting opportunities we're going to be able to work together with them on, and we're excited to be able to do that.
So it's been a great trip, it's been a great visit. It's exceeded all of our expectations.
QUESTION: How was —
QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, how does —
QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, you met the Chinese - your Chinese counterpart earlier today.
SECRETARY RUBIO: I did.
QUESTION: The President said just a couple of days ago that he enjoys good relations with China and the Chinese president. At your meeting, is that the sense you get - that you have good relations with China?
SECRETARY RUBIO: It was a very constructive meeting. Obviously, look, we're two big, powerful countries, and there are always going to be issues that we disagree on. I think there are some areas of potential cooperation. I thought it was a very constructive, positive meeting, and a lot of work to do. He's absolutely right that the President has a very good relationship with President Xi. It tracks back to his first term. And obviously there are some issues we're going to have to work through, and that's to be expected with countries of our size and scope and influence in the world - two global powers such as the United States and China. But I thought it was a very constructive and positive meeting and gave us some things we can work on together.
QUESTION: Do you think they're going to —
QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, what was your message to the foreign minister in the meeting?
SECRETARY RUBIO: Which foreign minister? I've been meeting the foreign minister —
QUESTION: Foreign Minister Wang Yi.
SECRETARY RUBIO: Oh. Well, look, it's very constructive. I think as I said, the President has a very positive working relationship with President Xi, and obviously the relationship I have with the foreign minister should reflect that. So we acknowledged there are some issues that are going to be - we have to work through, not just beyond trade but others, but I thought it was a very constructive and positive meeting and gave us a lot to work on. So that was our message, was the opportunity here to achieve some strategic stability and identify areas where we can cooperate together on and build better communications and working trust.
QUESTION: What are the odds of a meeting —
QUESTION: What are some areas of cooperation?
SECRETARY RUBIO: What?
QUESTION: What are some of those areas of cooperation? The administration hasn't spelled those out yet, so —
SECRETARY RUBIO: Well, we're going to work through those. We're not - we don't - I don't have any announcement for you right now. But it was a very constructive meeting. I think we left it feeling as though there are some areas we're going to be able to work together on. And obviously, as we work through those and we do that in conjunction with the Chinese side, we'll make public announcements. The last interaction of our trade representatives was quite positive, and we can build on that and other areas of potential cooperation.
Yeah.
QUESTION: What are the odds for a meeting or the outlook for a meeting? We know President Trump has expressed interest in a meeting with President Xi this year, and President Xi has reciprocated with an invitation to China for the President and First Lady. What's the outlook or what are the odds of a meeting happening this year after this - after your initial —
SECRETARY RUBIO: Yeah, no, the odds are high. I think both sides want to see it happen. Obviously we have to build the right atmosphere and the right deliverables so that a visit isn't just a visit, but it actually has some takeaways from it that are concrete. But there's a strong desire on both sides to do it. The President wants to do it. The Chinese side wants to see it happen. President Xi has said that publicly. So I think the odds are high. I don't have a date for you, but I think it's coming. It'll happen.
QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, what do you say to those who make the argument that the U.S. tariffs or the threat of those tariffs in the region actually creates an opening for China to be seen as the stable economic partner here?
SECRETARY RUBIO: I don't agree with that assessment. I mean, look, at the end of the day the United States has built these tremendous trade imbalances over the last 30 or 40 years. It's unfair to America and American workers and American - in addition to threaten our industrial capacity. Trade needed to be revisited. The President campaigned on that, and that's what he's doing, and he's resetting it on a global scale.
At the end of the day, look, I think countries are going to trade with multiple countries. We don't view this as an opening for anyone. We don't view it that way. We view it as an opportunity to reset global trade in a way that's fair for Americans after two or three decades of unfairness. If you look at some of these trade deficits, they're massive. They're massive. That has to be addressed, and that's not sustainable at its current - the current direction that it had gone. This should have been done a long time ago. President Trump's finally done it. And I think countries understand that.
This was different. If this was us targeting 10 countries or five countries, then I would understand why countries would be upset. But the truth of the matter is we're resetting tariff levels with virtually every country in the world. And so I understand - if you had a deal where you were running these huge trade deficits with the United States and exporting a lot to the U.S. and built your economy around exports, but had very little import or very little economic activity coming in from the United States, I understand why you don't want that to change. But I think most mature leaders - and everybody here is a mature leader - understands that that's not a sustainable dynamic. It was one that had to be changed, and that's what the President's doing. So we're going to be okay.
QUESTION: And in discussing trade with these counterparts in the region, did you open the aperture at all and also tell them that this is an opportunity for them to bring into the conversation or the negotiation other elements of the U.S. relationship, whether it be security elements, broader than trade?
SECRETARY RUBIO: Well, I think that we want to expand on all the other issues, but I think we need to bifurcate the two. Primarily the trade conversations have been about trade, and that's how the President's treated it. Now, that doesn't mean that there - the bulk of our meetings here were not about trade. I'm not the trade negotiator for the United States. We certainly appreciate the role that trade plays in our bilateral relationships with individual countries. But the bulk of our talks here have been about all the other things that we cooperate on, whether it's civil nuclear cooperation, whether it's respecting international law when it comes to air rights and maritime rights and freedom of navigation and things of this nature, and other opportunities to work together.
So what's been the bulk of our conversations and it's been very positively received.
