Rick Stengel: Having an ‘Incredible Shrinking Oligarch Summit’ in China ‘Is a Terrible Message to the American People’

EXCERPT:

STENGEL: "Well, and bringing the family along, it’s like they're royal family or something. They say the quiet part out loud. The sons have business interests in China that the president is promoting. Having this sort of incredible shrinking oligarch summit, I think is a terrible message to the American people, right, that it’s like, you know, supposedly they’re negotiating on behalf of the people, trying maybe to reduce tariffs so people pay less money, but, in fact, you have these guys that are trying to get incredible billion-dollar contracts. It’s just — it just feels like a kind of a corruption express. And of course, Trump has so little leverage now, in part because of what’s happening in Iran, in part because of the Supreme Court ruling on tariffs that he can’t impose them anymore. I mean, to use that — the dumb language of the administration, China holds most of the cards."