Trump’s Audacious Vegas Diplomatic Gamble

By Greg Rushford

January 18, 2020

Meeting in the Vietnamese seaside resort of Nha Trang yesterday, the foreign ministers of the ten ASEAN countries — the Association of Southeast Asian Nations — tentatively decided to accept President Donald Trump’s offer to host a special U.S.-ASEAN summit in the United States. The confab will be held on March 14, in Las Vegas, the Bangkok Post reported.

If all other things were equal, this would constitute a welcome piece of news. Trump has offended diplomats across the region by snubbing top Asian leaders’ summits for the last three years. The venerable Australian national security authority Carl Thayer voiced the frustrations of many when, in 2017, he likened the first Trump snub to an act of “political vandalism.” But now, Trump has signaled that the United States remains interested-and-involved in one of the world’s most dynamic regions. 

But with The Donald, nothing ever seems to be so simple. His awkward diplomatic- and political timing has raised eyebrows in key Asian capitals since Trump first floated the invitation last November. And Trump’s insistence upon the famous Nevada gambling and entertainment city as the venue has raised even more concerns. Plus, hardly for the first time with Trump, there is the distinct whiff of presidential self-dealing and cronyism in the air. 

I’ve been watching this diplomatic drama play out behind the scenes for the last two months. Here’s a quick rundown of the concerns that are being raised in well-connected Asian diplomatic and business circles.  

Awkward timing

First, the manner in which Trump offered to host a summit in the United States was perceived in the region as arrogant. He didn’t even invite the Asian chiefs of state in person, sending instead his national security adviser, Robert O’Brien, to a November 2019 summit of Asian leaders in Thailand. There, O’Brien delivered a letter with Trump’s proposal. Offended at the American president latest snub, seven of the ten ASEAN chiefs of state refused to meet with O’Brien.

Another problem with the timing was the familiar diplomatic ineptness factor that has become normal whenever Trump interacts with fellow world leaders.Top-level summits that involve coordinating the schedules of presidents and prime ministers usually take many months, perhaps a year, as the complex logistical challenges are worked out. Trump, in November 2019, was expecting the leaders of ASEAN’s ten countries to change their schedules to accommodate his, and by March 2020. In response to the raised diplomatic eyebrows, all that Trump’s aides offered, with no further explanation, was that March of 2020 best fit Trump’s schedule.

Of course it did. March 14 is just three days before the Democratic presidential primaries in the key electoral U.S. states of Ohio, Illinois, and Florida. Trump’s prospective Democratic Party challengers will then no doubt be busy fighting each other for the Democratic presidential nomination. They will project the image of mere partisan politicians jockeying for personal advantage.  

By contrast, Trump will be poised to appear presidential, a respected world leader hosting a diplomatic summit involving important Asian top leaders who have come to the United States, to pay their due respects. While he could easily do such in, say, Washington, D.C., Trump appears to have another agenda than projecting a sober image. 

An unserious venue

To be sure, Las Vegas projects anything but the image of presidential sobriety: the famous casinos, the sexy-dancer shows, the tables for high-rollers, the paparazzi with their flash bulbs, and so on. Every ASEAN summit is also well-known for the photo opportunity of the presidents and prime ministers, wearing the host country’s traditional costumes, sometimes a tad outlandish. What are the ten ASEAN leaders expected to do as they pose for posterity in Vegas: wear Elvis costumes? 

And in which luxury hotels and casinos will they choose to stay?

The whiff of presidential self-dealing

When Donald Trump is involved, world leaders can never be sure how to ascertain whether he is seeking to advance legitimate U.S. national security interests, or whether he is mainly looking to advance the Trump brand and his family’s personal financial interests. 

Speaking of branding, it happens that Las Vegas is the site of a Trump International Hotel. 

The Trump Organization’s promotional materials for the hotel boast of “our sleek, gold building” with its 1,282 “exquisitely appointed” accommodations. “This is living to the highest standard — the Trump level of luxury in a city that never disappoints.”

If some Asian leaders would risk putting their country’s sovereign wealth funds on the tables, they might end up disappointed, goes one sotto voce quip from one veteran Asia-watcher when informed of Trump’s preference for Vegas.

The 64-story Trump hotel — the tallest in Vegas, naturally — doesn’t have a casino. It does have, however, lots of Chinese tourists, who have been coming in increased numbers since Trump won the 2016 presidential election, the Washington Post has reported. And the Trump Organization has luxury condos for sale, complete with whirlpool baths, plush beds, and bars.

Such sales opportunities have sparked more sotto voce quips — to the effect that the condos could be of possible interest to Russian speakers who would know how to conceal their ownership behind shell corporations. Trump properties in Florida are crammed with such people, according to an authoritative Reuters investigative report. 

So where would the ASEAN leaders and their entourages be expected to stay? Who would occupy the “ultra luxurious” presidential suites that the Trump Organization boasts of? Where would the U.S. Secret Service and the plethora of American diplomatic and security aides stay? Where would U.S. tax dollars come into the picture? The answers to such questions have not been made public.

It’s worth recalling how Trump backed off his plans to host this year’s G-7 summit of world leaders at his National Doral golf resort in Florida, but only after a public outcry against the president’s obvious financial conflicts of interest. That was last October.

But once the president gets a notion in his mind, he is famous for not letting go easily. A month after the G-7 embarrassment, Trump quietly offered to host still another important summit in the United States. This one would have brought the corporate leaders of the top-level Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation forum to the United States — again, this March, again in Las Vegas. That idea was quickly shot down by the offended Malaysians, who are chairing APEC this year. 

On November 7, the Straits Times newspaper in Singapore reported that Trump’s offer to host an APEC summit in Vegas “was not a good idea,” as Malaysia’s foreign minister, Saifuddin Abdullah, put it. Apparently, that was that. Since that press report, nothing has been heard of hosting any APEC summits in Vegas this year.

The cronyism factor

Nobody is considered to be closer to Donald Trump and his family than billionaire Sheldon Adelson. (The Adelsons are worth an estimated $40-plus billion, according to various published speculations).

Adelson’s importance to Trump was on public display last week, when the president held a ceremony in the White House to celebrate the recently inked “Phase One” U.S.-China trade deal. A wide array of leading American political-and business leaders were in the audience, along with Adelson and his wife Miriam. They are,Trump declared, “two very good friends” and simply “great people.”

Conspicuously, Trump praised the Sheldon and Miriam Adelson before mentioning Henry Kissinger, a covey of sitting U.S. senators, son-in-law Jared Kushner, television demagogue Lou Dobbs, and the heads of such blue-chip American corporations as Boeing, Honeywell, Mastercard, and Dow Chemical. 

Ambitious Mega Donors

Trump has good reason to like the Adelsons.They gave him perhaps $10 million in campaign cash to help him win his 2016 presidential race, plus another $5 million and chump change for the January 2017 Trump inaugural party — and then upwards of $100 million to back Republican congressional candidates in the 2018 elections. 

Sheldon Adelson is well known in Asia. His breathtaking Marina Bay Sands that illustrates Singapore’s skyline was highlighted in the movie Crazy Rich Asians. He also has casinos in Macau, which cater to Chinese tourists. 

Adelson may be 85 years old and reportedly ailing, but he is still ambitious. The gambling magnate has been working hard to obtain a casino license in Japan. Toward that end, his friend Donald Trump is thought to have pressed Adelson’s Japanese aspirations with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, according to a well-researched report by ProPublica’s Justin Elliott that was published late last year.

The ambitious octogenarian has also been hoping to open a casino in North Korea. That country is presently an impoverished wasteland, but one which Trump has also said he believes has potential high-value real estate opportunities. 

Adelson is also well-known in Asia as one of Israel’s strongest supporters. He is a fervent defender of Trump’s hardline policies towards Iran’s ayatollahs, and was thrilled when Trump moved the United States Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem. To ASEAN leaders of countries that have substantial Muslim populations, this could be the most awkward aspect of Trump’s Vegas proposals. 

Some Asia watchers contacted for this article said they found it somewhat of a stretch to imagine the prime ministers of Thailand or Malaysia, or the president of Indonesia, or the sultan of Brunei — all countries with substantial Muslim populations — rubbing shoulders with the likes of Donald Trump and Sheldon Adelson in Las Vegas. And it is near impossible to imagine that, one way or the other, Adelson would not be involved in an ASEAN summit held in his city. 

And that’s where matters presently stand. The final decision on whether to attend a US-ASEAN summit in Las Vegas on March 14 will be made by the chiefs of state of the ten ASEAN countries, the January 17 article in the Bangkok Post reported. 

Who would show up, and who might not, is a matter of intense speculation.

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, for one, has vowed not to travel to the United States for any reason. (At least, everyone blames congressional Democrats, not Trump, for that one. Duterte is understandably concerned over recent legislation that could deny his entourage entry visas, on human-rights grounds.)

Trump forgot another thing — nobody seems to know what the agenda for a US-ASEAN summit would be. 

Toward that end, all eyes will be on Vietnam, which is chairing ASEAN this year. Will the leadership in Hanoi seize the opportunity to work with the Americans to press the Chinese hard over Beijing’s illegal aggression in waters of the South China Sea that are rightfully within the exclusive economic zones of such ASEAN members as Vietnam, Malaysia, and the Philippines?  

If so, there is a real opportunity for Donald Trump, despite his unfortunate diplomatic style, to shine. Trump could work to accomplish something that his predecessor in the Oval Office, Barack Obama, utterly failed to deliver. Obama stood by passively while Xi Jinping’s China weaponized the South China Sea — clearly in violation of international law. 

Stay tuned.

America’s Philippines Blunder

America’s Philippines Blunder
Failing U.S. trade policy exacerbates Manila’s doubts of Washington’s security promises.

By GREG RUSHFORD
July 28, 2016 12:46 p.m. ET

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry on Wednesday discussed the “full range” of economic and security issues with Rodrigo Duterte, the Philippines’ newly elected president. The visit comes in the wake of The Hague’s July 12 ruling that Chinese actions in the South China Sea violate Philippine rights.

Mr. Kerry’s diplomatic mission was to assure Mr. Duterte that Manila can count on Washington’s mutual-defense promises. But there are also Mr. Duterte’s doubts that the U.S. can support the Philippine trade and economy.

When Mr. Duterte was sworn in to office on June 30, U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman announced a new trade policy that upends important economic growth plans in the Philippines. It threatens to wipe out an estimated $100 million annual boost to Philippine exports of travel goods such as luxury handbags, wallets and backpacks. It also complicates Philippine investment aspirations to create some 75,000 travel-goods-related jobs in the next five years.

At first glance, Mr. Froman’s announcement gives no hint of the economic controversy it has sparked. He says that President Obama wants to make “a powerful contribution to lifting people out of poverty and supporting growth in some of the poorest countries in the world, while also reducing costs to American consumers and businesses.” The policy benefits 43 least-developed beneficiary countries, such as Cambodia and Haiti, and 38 African nations. Pursuant to the U.S. Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) program, these countries will no longer have to pay stiff tariffs of up to 20% on handbags, wallets and other travel goods exported to the U.S.
The U.S. decision to give preferential treatment to the industry’s small players, while blindsiding the most competitive producers, is perplexing. Cambodia, for instance, holds a modest 0.4% of the U.S. market, producing mostly backpacks. Africa’s total travel-goods exports to the U.S. amount to roughly one hundredth of one percent market share. As a result, the policy gives just two countries—China and Vietnam—a combined 90% share of the $5 billion U.S. travel-goods market.
It is unlikely that preferential treatment will prompt least-developed countries to boost their exports. Even with 15 years of duty-free access to U.S. clothing markets under the African Growth and Opportunity Act, 40 African countries combined to export less than 1%, or $1 billion, of garments each year to the U.S. The Philippines alone exceeds Africa in clothing exports by more than $100 million.

Diplomats from other countries and industry giants in the U.S., such as Coach, Columbia Sportswear and Kate Spade, have written to Mr. Froman asking for an explanation. On Wednesday 14 members of U.S. Congress, including 10 from the powerful Ways and Means Committee that has jurisdiction over trade, also issued a strong letter to the U.S. trade chief. But Mr. Froman has yet to offer any economic rationale for the decision, nor is there any evidence on the public record to support it.

Developing countries with larger market shares of the travel-goods industry, such as India, Indonesia, Pakistan, the Philippines, Sri Lanka and Thailand, must now reconsider their plans to expand their investments. Major U.S. players such as Coach and Michael Kors, which looked to U.S. trade officials to provide financial incentives to shift production away from China, will now put those investment plans on hold. China is thus poised to keep its 85% share of the U.S. travel-goods market.

Vietnam, as a communist country, is not eligible for the GSP preferences. But in the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal, the U.S. agreed to give the Vietnamese—who now hold a 5% market share—the same duty-free treatment withheld from GSP-eligible countries. Pakistan’s Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif thought he had received assurances directly from President Obama last year that U.S. trade officials understood the “importance” of increasing enhanced market access for Pakistan’s GSP-covered exports. Diplomats I have spoken to chafe at the unfairness.

Viewed through the Philippine lens, the failure to connect economic cooperation with the security aspect of Obama’s pivot to Asia is glaring. Cambodia, apparently thanks to financial inducements from Beijing, has been the spoiler whenever the Philippines has sought solidarity from its partners in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in standing up to China in the South China Sea.

Asked repeatedly for his side of the story, Mr. Froman asserted through a spokesman that “travel goods are a product particularly well-suited to be produced in least-developed countries.” He declined to explain further.

While the broader security relationship will survive, it is worth noting that in international economic diplomacy, like in personal relationships, unnecessary smaller slights erode trust. With the Chinese watching on the sidelines and eager to buy their way out of their South China Sea mess, this is not a wise time to rub the volatile new Philippine leader the wrong way.

Mr. Rushford edits an online journal that specializes in international economic diplomacy.

Tone Deaf

 If war is too important to be left to the generals, as Georges Clemenceau famously said, it is unwise to leave important international economic decisions to technicians who fail to connect them to broader U.S. national security priorities. This story concerns one such decision that was announced by U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman on June 30. It immediately became the subject of heated controversy in Washington’s international trade circles.

It’s not difficult to see why.

Froman — characteristically — crafted his decision in excessive secrecy. An exhaustive research of the available public record turns up no economic evidence to support it. Pressed hard to defend it, Froman has been unable to point to any serious economic rationale. The intended beneficiaries, mainly in Sub-Saharan Africa, are not positioned to take advantage of it.

Meanwhile, important U.S. trading partners across Southeast Asia and the Indian Subcontinent that could benefit — from the Philippines, Thailand, and Indonesia to Pakistan, Sri Lanka and India —instead will be hurt. Diplomats from 14 of the affected countries just yesterday sent a strong letter to Froman bluntly expressing their “disappointment” concerning U.S. economic discrimination against them. The signatories included Brazil, Tunisia, Moldova, Thailand, Philippines, Indonesia, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, India, and Paraguay. Privately, diplomats I’ve spoken with express their frustrations with the inequities of U.S. trade policies in, well, much stronger language.

The unusually strong criticisms would surprise a casual reader of Froman’s June 30 press release. On the surface, at least, it appeared to be a shining example of American generosity aimed at helping the world’s least-developed countries. The Obama White House, declared Froman, wanted to make “a powerful contribution to lifting people out of poverty and supporting growth in some of the poorest countries in the world, while also reducing costs to American consumers and businesses.”

But will it? More than two weeks of weeks of intensive independent research — including repeated efforts to obtain Froman’s side of the story — suggests otherwise.

Let’s take it from the top:

The intended beneficiaries are African countries like Ethiopia, Rwanda, Ghana, Lesotho and Kenya, and also impoverished Cambodia and Haiti. They will be given preferential access to the $5 billion U.S. market for travel goods: think suitcases, handbags, wallets, and backpacks. No longer will their exports of 28 lines of handbags and such face U.S. tariffs that range from 4.5 percent to a stiff 20 percent. (Last year, Congress authorized adding travel goods to developing countries eligible to participate in the Generalized System of Preferences program, and for the 40 member countries of the African Growth and Opportunity Act.)

The entire American travel goods industry was blindsided. To understate the matter, the executives who actually make the investment decisions were not thrilled that federal officials with scant business experience would think that they knew more than the CEOs about where their future travel-goods investments should be directed. Outraged, the American Apparel & Footwear Association, the Outdoor Industry Association, the Sports & Fitness Industry Association, and the Travel Goods Association, have been demanding that Froman explain his decision, so far without success.

Comparing the June 30 Froman press release with the realities of the $5 billion U.S. travel-goods market sheds light on the emotions the U.S. trade negotiator has unleashed.

First, Froman’s determination does not appear to make anything close to a truly “powerful contribution to lifting people out of poverty,” and does not seem to be supported. Most of the intended beneficiaries, alas, have precious few travel goods to export, so the US preferences won’t help them much.

At least Cambodia, with 0.4 percent of the US market, does have a small-but-vibrant travel-goods industry, apparently mainly involving backpacks, that stands to benefit. So the Cambodians are poised to be winners. Still, Cambodia’s ambassador to the United States, Chum Bunrong, signed the July 18 letter from 14 countries expressing concerns about the discriminatory treatment. Cambodia had sought the GSP preferences, but had not lobbied to exclude other deserving countries.

Meanwhile, the Africans, the major intended beneficiaries, simply aren’t important players in the travel-goods industry. They aren’t positioned to become such anytime in the foreseeable future. All of Africa’s travel-goods exports to the United States amount to a roughly one hundredth of one percent market share.

There is (happily) some foreign investor interest in developing the African travel-goods industry, involving as much Chinese as U.S. and European multinationals. But (unhappily) not much. Stiff U.S. tariffs aren’t the main problems — clogged ports, bad roads, red tape, and too many other economic inefficiencies to list in one line are far more important obstacles to viable African trade expansion.

The Africans also have been slow to take advantage of the generous trade-facilitation financial assistance pursuant to the World Trade Organization’s so-called Bali Package aimed at smoothing the flow of goods across presently difficult borders. The WTO inked its trade-facilitation deal when ministers met on the famous Indonesian resort island in December 2013. To date, only eleven African WTO members have ratified it. One struggles to find a sense of economic urgency.

Moreover, making backpacks, for instance, with all their zippers and complex components, is far more difficult than making T-shirts. Yet even with 15 years of duty-free access to the U.S. clothing market under the African Growth and Opportunity Act, all of Africa’s apparel exports to the U.S. still only amount to about $1 billion annually. That’s less than one percent of the U.S. clothing market.

The Philippines, one of the smaller exporters of garments to the United States, exports about $1.1 billion worth of clothing to the U.S. annually. That’s roughly $100 million more than the yearly garment exports from all of the Africa countries combined. And Bangladesh’s US clothing exports are more than five times Africa’s total.

The Africans get duty-free treatment for their garment exports pursuant to the African Growth and Opportunity Act. But the Philippines, Cambodia, Bangladesh, and the rest of the world’s rag trade face stiff U.S. clothing tariffs. Those tariffs mainly hover in the 12- 16 percent range, but can shoot sharply higher. The unavoidable economic bottom line: African countries that struggle just to make shirts and trousers, even with the existing AGOA duty-free preferences, are not poised to attract major investments in travel goods.

Consider further the June 30 Froman press release’s boast of “reducing costs” for American consumers and businesses by slashing tariffs on travel goods for Africa. Driving up costs by upending multi-million dollar investment plans of major players in the industry — like Coach, Michael Kors, Under Armour, Columbia Sportswear, and Kate Spade — is more like it.

That’s because such stalwarts of the American travel-goods industry have been planning to enhance their investments in the countries which are poised to take advantage of them, mainly the Philippines, Thailand, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Pakistan and India. The U.S. industry leaders have been aiming to shift production to such developing countries away from China, which holds an estimated 85 percent of the U.S. market. But now, that production will mostly remain in China — ironically making the Chinese the biggest winners of the U.S. trade representative’s decision.

Vietnam holds another 5 percent of the American travel-goods market. As a communist country, the Vietnamese are not eligible to participate in the American GSP preference program. But Froman has agreed in the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal to give Vietnam the same duty-free treatment for the same 28 tariff lines of travel goods. Put another way, U.S. trade policy has been shaped to carve out at least 90 percent of the American travel-goods market to two communist countries: China and Vietnam.

Meanwhile, the losers in Southeast Asia and the Indian Subcontinent will just twist in the proverbial wind. Froman’s June 30 announcement did not flat-out deny such developing countries the GSP duty-free preferences. Rather, the U.S. trade chief has said he is merely “deferring” their petitions into an indefinite future before deciding whether they deserve them. The government-induced market uncertainty, of course, is a nightmare scenario for any investor whose plans are thrown into limbo.

Do the math: Froman and President Obama will leave their offices in six months. It takes perhaps 18 months after an investment decision is made to get a travel-goods factory up-and-running. So assuming that such an investment plan were to be made this week, we’re looking at early 2018 before, say, a travel-goods operation would be established in, say, Rwanda. Then it would take another several years before export data would be generated. U.S. trade officials might be able, sometime after the 2020 presidential election, to start a lengthy review process. Imagine how the CEO of a major U.S. multinational would feel about that.

And imagine how poor women in places like the Philippines — a country of 100 million people, some 25 million of whom are suffering in poverty — might feel about the June 30 U.S. trade action that put equally deserving African workers’ interests ahead of theirs, should someone ask their opinions. (To their credit, the Africans did not ask that workers in other poor countries be excluded from the US travel-goods decision.)

Ironically, on June 30, as Froman was releasing his press release in Washington, the Philippines was swearing in a new president. Rodrigo Duterte has not been shy about the fact that over the years he has developed a certain attitude toward perceived American high-handedness.

President Duterte comes from the southern Philippine island of Mindanao. He and some of his key economic and security advisors have seen this sort of discriminatory behavior from Washington before. For years, Washington officials have refused to consider slashing high U.S. tariffs that would boost the economic prospects of (mostly Muslim) workers in Mindanao’s canned tuna industry. This is another example of how U.S. economic policies can be disconnected from important diplomatic priorities to win trust in the Islamic world.

And more recently, U.S. trade chief Froman has even turned a deaf ear on Philippine requests that garment workers in typhoon-ravaged areas be given duty-free treatment for their clothing exports to the United States. While this might be a largely symbolic gesture in the grand scheme of things, America would be highly praised for showing such generosity. Instead, on the very day he was sworn into office, President Duterte was greeted by still another example of American ungenerous economic thinking.

The Philippine travel-goods industry had been looking to create an additional $100 million in annual exports to the United States — that’s $500 million in five years, involving some 75,000 new jobs. Now U.S. Trade Representative Froman has put those aspirations on indefinite hold.

The Philippines is also one of America’s closest treaty allies, and sits astride sea lanes in the South China Sea that are of vital importance to global commerce. But the Chinese have an agenda that would put Beijing in charge of Philippine waters.

On July 12, Beijing’s claims to economic domination in the South China Sea were branded illegal by a well-crafted international tribunal’s ruling in The Hague. But while seriously embarrassed, the Chinese have other cards to play. They are infamous for their special brand of economic diplomacy (suitcases full of money).

China’s top leaders have made it no secret that they will try to offer financial inducements to the new Duterte administration. Meanwhile, the US travel-goods announcement has given Filipinos another reason to doubt America’s trustworthiness as an economic partner. Sometimes in international economic diplomacy, as in personal life, it’s the smaller slights that do the most to fray relationships.

Pakistan, although hardly a trusted ally like the Philippines, is nevertheless another country that is important in the U.S. national security equation. Now the Pakistanis must wonder how truthful President Obama was to their prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, when Sharif visited the White House last year.

On October 22, 2015, Sharif and Obama issued a joint statement that took note of the “importance” of increased “market access’ for Pakistan in the GSP preferences program. “President Obama indicated that the United States will help Pakistan create conditions for accelerated trade and investment-driven growth,” the statement noted. Now, Froman’s June 30 decision to defer Pakistani hopes for duty-free treatment regarding travel goods raises more questions about American sincerity.

Not everyone is unhappy with the U.S. trade representative. Stephen Lande, the president of a respected Washington consulting firm, Manchester Trade, has had many years of experience with Africa. “I am happy” that Froman decided to give African countries preferences on travel goods, Lande says. “Because that’s what AGOA is all about.”

Lande says that he hopes that Froman’s decision will encourage CEOs in the travel-goods industry to put more money into Africa. Countries in Southeast Asia like the Philippines could acquire the same GSP benefits by joining an expanded TPP trade pact, Lande adds.

Froman, meanwhile, is hunkered down. He refused to allow the U.S. trade officials who worked on the case to explain an economic rationale for his June 30 announcement. He wouldn’t even say which office handled the paperwork (apparently the economic-policy shop run by Assistant U.S. Trade Representative Edward Gresser). The organization chart at the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative — who reports to whom, and on what — is considered classified information.

When I pressed, Froman finally asserted through a spokesman, Trevor Kincaid, that “travel goods are a product particularly well-suited to be produced in least-developed countries.”

Will that be the last word? Stay tuned.