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Aug. 29 (UPI) -- 2020 Democratic presidential hopeful Beto O'Rourke unveiled a trade plan Thursday, calling President Donald Trump's dispute with China a "disaster for American farmers." The former Texas congressman said he would not rule out tariffs in all cases, but he would not use them "to drive anti-immigrant agendas," or "further pain to American businesses and workers" like Trump has.
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If elected president, "Beto will end Trump's trade wars, which have not only failed to curtail China's economic aggression, but hurt American workers," the plan said.
O'Rourke would eliminate the U.S. tariffs on Chinese goods in exchange for China revoking its tariffs on U.S. products "like soybeans, beef, cars and planes," the plan noted.
"Trump's tariffs are an attack on U.S. exporters," the plan said. "They have driven up the price of imported intermediate parts, made the dollar less competitive, and caused other countries to retaliate against us with their own tariffs."
Instead of tariffs, O'Rourke proposed other methods to "defend American values and interests" against China's "anti-competitive behavior."
Among the other methods, are working to "lead a global coalition" to modernize the World Trade Organization to deal with currency manipulation, climate change and other current trade issues.
O'Rourke will also consider working will allies to "engage in concerted countervailing duties cases," as opposed to the broad duties Trump has announced that have pushed the tariff rate on Chinese imports from 3 percent to around 20 percent.
He would also consider unilateral actions such as "delisting Chinese companies from U.S. stock exchanges when they refuse to make their audit work-papers available for inspection," the plan said.
O'Rourke is one of 10 candidates who will appear in the next Democratic primary debate on Sept. 12.
In campaign stops in Iowa, which relies heavily on agriculture, he criticized Trump's trade war more often than most other candidates.
