U.S. Rep. Bill Pascrell, Jr. (D-NJ-09), a member of the House Ways and Means Subcommittee on Trade, today blasted the announced phase one trade agreement with China.

“This so-called deal is nothing to celebrate,” said Rep. Pascrell, a longtime critic of Trump’s trade policies and China’s authoritarian government. “Trump’s announcement is the equivalent of an arsonist demanding credit for putting away his matches. It’s a publicity stunt that does not make structural change to China’s economy or have a tangible enforcement mechanism to hold China accountable. If anything, this deal further entrenches our longstanding problems with China by further empowering China to subsidize state owned enterprises. This is yet another broken Trump promise.

“The damage from Trump’s chaotic trade war has been so deep his government has resorted to billions of dollars in socialist payments to buy electoral goodwill. These bailouts are twice as large as the premiums to automakers Republicans decried. After all that we have little to show for it but a full-blown retreat. That they won’t even let us see the fine print tells us all we need to know about which side did better. Perhaps worst of all, Donald Trump sold out America’s longstanding commitments to democracy and human rights by once again remaining silent to the Chinese Communist Party’s violence against the persecuted Uyghurs and the brave Hong Kong protesters. Donald Trump is the worst deal-maker in the world.”