Donald Trump is still beating the tariff drum as he desperately tries to get China to play ball. Unfortunately for him they are refusing. Now the U.S. president is demanding that China start exporting rare-earth magnets to the U.S. or face a 200% tariff on other exports.
Trump’s trade war with China has been a rather humiliating affair for the president but he persists nonetheless, making demands of the country despite not being in the best position to bargain. Earlier this year it seemed the two countries were set to enter a full blown trade war with tariffs on either side ballooning to ridiculous proportions. However, a truce between the U.S. and China was reached which is set to last until November, unless Trump messes it up of course.
Donald Trump wants China’s magnets
Despite the apparent truce, the president has demanded that China give the U.S. magnets or else the tariff rates will be increased, he told reporters, “They have to give us magnets, if they don’t give us magnets, then we have to charge them 200% tariffs or something.”
The “or something” just screams confidence in his approach don’t you think? Trump did say that he doubts there will be an issue as the U.S. and China’s trade relations have improved significantly in the past few months. Of course, with Donald Trump at the helm, nothing is certain and anything can fall apart at a moment’s notice so his words don’t exactly inspire confidence.
“China has to give us magnets. If they don't, we charge a 200% tariff or something. Nobody needed magnets until they convinced everybody 20 years ago let’s all do magnets." – Trump
— Spencer Hakimian (@SpencerHakimian) August 25, 2025
?????
pic.twitter.com/hI91SCnwjd
We’re not talking about fridge magnets here, these are rare earth magnets used in electronics and whatnot, but the way he talks about them you have to wonder if he’s imagining them to be fridge magnets.
The president then launched into a rather odd tirade about how China “took a monopoly of the world’s magnets,” Trump claimed that “Nobody needed magnets until they convinced everybody 20 years ago let’s all do magnets.” If that sounds idiotic, that’s because it is. Sometimes it’s hard to interpret what Trump actually means and this is certainly one of those times.
America’s getting magnets
However, fear not, as Trump predicts that the U.S. will get China’s magnets within a year. He rambles on, “we’re heavy into the world of magnets,” before going on to say that the U.S. has leverage in the form of airplane parts which he suggests can counter China’s monopoly on magnets.
People weren’t exactly on board with Trump’s war for magnets, mocking the president’s apparent new obsession. One person joked, “One of my favourite hobbies,” while another asked, “How will increasing the price that AMERICANS pay for magnets by 200% convince the Chinese to sell them to us???”
Full disclosure, I haven’t read The Art of the Deal, but this doesn’t seem like a good way to go about negotiating, maybe Trump hasn’t thought this one through fully. Still, if he does manage to pull it off I guess we can celebrate by buying cheap magnets while we wait for affordable groceries.
