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The United States bought $439bn worth of goods from China in 2024 – more than three times the $143.5bn it sold in return. That $295bn gap, known as the trade deficit, is something US President Donald Trump is determined to shrink.

In an effort to close the gap, Trump has raised tariffs on China to 145 percent. This means Chinese goods sold to the US are now taxed at 2.45 times their original price, making them much more expensive and less competitive in the US market.

China has retaliated with 125 percent levies on US goods.

The tit-for-tat escalation of tariffs between the world’s biggest trading powers has led to uncertainty on what it means for the cost and production of everyday items such as smartphones, semiconductors and clothing.

China’s Ministry of Commerce said it is willing to “fight to the end” and has accused the US of violating the rules of the World Trade Organization.

February 1 

On February 1, President Trump signed an executive order imposing a 10 percent tariff on China. The order also placed 25 percent tariffs on Canadian and Mexican imports.

March 4 

The president placed an additional 10 percent tariff on Chinese goods on February 27, which came into effect on March 4.

April 2 

A 10 percent tariff was applied to all nations importing goods to the US as well as higher tariffs on select countries, including China that had a 34 percent tariff placed on it.

April 4 

China’s Ministry of Finance announced a retaliatory 34 percent tariff on imports from the US.

April 7

President Trump threatened more levies on China’s retaliatory tariffs with an additional 50 percent tariff on Beijing, meaning that China could face 104 percent taxes on all exports.

April 9

China responded with an additional 50 percent tariff on US goods, meaning an additional 84 percent import tax on US goods coming to China.

President Trump later said he would pause reciprocal tariffs for the next 90 days, bringing tariff levels to a baseline 10 percent. However, this did not apply to China; instead, President Trump raised tariffs on exports to 125 percent.

April 10

The White House stated the 125 percent reciprocal tariff on China would be levied in addition to the 20 percent tariff already imposed, bringing the final tariff rate to 145 percent.

What items have been excluded?

On April 11, President Trump said smartphones, laptops and a host of other tech components would be spared from so-called “reciprocal tariffs”.

The US Customs and Border Protection agency listed 20 product categories, including all computers, laptops, disc drives and automatic data processing equipment. It also included semiconductor devices, equipment, memory chips and flat panel displays.

However, on Sunday, Trump threatened new tariffs on Chinese electronic goods, three days after his administration announced exemptions. On Monday, he advanced plans to introduce tariffs on semiconductors and pharmaceutical products.

What does the US sell to China?

In 2024, the US sold $143.5bn worth of goods to China.

China’s biggest purchases from the US were mineral fuels, oil seeds, machinery and aircraft. As a single product, soya beans are the largest US export to China, primarily used as pig feed.

In 2024, the US’s main exports to China included:

• Mineral fuels ($13.4bn) accounting for 10.7 percent of total exports
• Oil seeds and oleaginous fruits ($13.3bn) accounting for 10.6 percent of total exports
• Electrical machinery, equipment and parts ($11.5bn) accounting for 9.1 percent of exports
• Nuclear reactors, boilers, machinery and mechanical appliances ($10.5bn) accounting for 8.3 percent of exports
• Aircraft, spacecraft and parts ($10.2bn) accounting for 8.1 percent of total exports.

What does the US buy from China?

In 2024, the US bought $439bn worth of goods from China.

China is a major supplier of electrical equipment and electronics including chips, laptops and smartphones to the US.

In 2024, the US’s main imports from China were:

• Electrical machinery, equipment and parts ($123.8bn) accounting for 28.2 percent of total imports
• Nuclear reactors, boilers, machinery and mechanical appliances ($82bn) accounting for 18.7 percent of imports
• Toys, games and sport equipment ($30bn) accounting for 6.8 percent of imports
• Plastics ($19.3bn) accounting for 4.4 percent of total imports
• Furniture, bedding and cushions ($18.5bn) accounting for 4.2 percent of imports.

What does each US state buy the most from China?

According to the US International Trade Administration, California buys the most of any other state from China. It bought $122.8bn worth of goods in 2024.

Illinois imported the second-most amount of goods from China at $42.1bn, followed by Texas, which bought $35.9bn worth of goods.

Texas sells the most of any other state to China. In 2024, it sold $22.5bn of goods to China. California sold the second-most of any state at $15.1bn, followed by Washington at $12bn.

Explore the table below to see which states import and export the most to and from China.

What are the main items coming from China by state?

Miscellaneous manufactured commodities are the leading imports for 15 states, including Connecticut, Georgia, Idaho, Kansas, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Missouri, New Jersey, Ohio, Oklahoma, Vermont, Virginia, Washington and Wyoming.

These include items like jewellery and for silverware manufacturing, sporting and athletic goods manufacturing, doll, toy, and game manufacturing, and all other miscellaneous manufacturing.

Communications equipment ranks second, being the top import for six states: Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Tennessee.

Which US state sells the most to China?

Animal slaughtering and processing is the leading export from six states to China, including Colorado, Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska, South Dakota and Utah.

Aerospace products and parts rank second, being the top export from five states: Arizona, Connecticut, Florida, Kentucky and Ohio.

Names marked with an asterisk have been changed to protect identities.

Paris, France – When Moussa*, an undocumented construction worker, joined a wildcat strike at the building site of Paris’s Adidas Arena in the early hours of October 17, 2023, he was hoping the protest might lead to him getting the papers he needed to travel home to Mali.

Since arriving in France in 2019, having first boarded a boat from Algeria to Spain, Moussa, 25, has not taken a single vacation. After his grandparents died during his time away, he felt an urge to return and mourn with his family.

For eight months, he worked at the arena, which has 8,000 seats and was being prepared for the 2024 Summer Olympics. More than 400 construction workers operated at the site.

He was compensated with normal pay slips by using someone else’s papers – a common strategy among undocumented workers. He was paid about 75 euros ($85) a day for gruelling 10-hour shifts at the arena – a rate, he said, that did not include transport expenses, masks or other protective gear.

Moussa’s bid paid off.

The workers occupied the site before dawn, blocked it off, and then negotiated all day. By the evening, they had a deal.

After intense discussions between Moussa’s employer, the city of Paris, the workers and their union, a list of 14 undocumented individuals who worked at the site was handed over to the French police prefecture, which deals with visa requests, in order for their paperwork to be processed.

They signed a framework agreement that would lead to a residency permit and health insurance. It was signed by the city of Paris, the construction company Bouygues, and several subcontractors.

But 18 months later, the dossiers have still not been approved. Only one of the 14 has been given an appointment at the Paris prefecture.

A number of the undocumented workers are beginning to wonder whether the delays are by design.

“We didn’t ask for much, just a residency permit and health insurance card. It’s our right. To this day we don’t have the right to work in this country,” Moussa said.

Three of the 14 workers and Rafika Rahmani, a lawyer for the CNT-SO union who focuses on the rights of expatriates, told Al Jazeera that they submitted all the information requested of them more than a year ago.

“We have payslips, we have everything. We’re playing by the rules. But so far, we haven’t had even a single summons,” said Adama*, one of the builders. “We have no idea why the files are taking so long. We’ve resubmitted them twice.

“It’s like being in prison in France,” added Adama, who has also struggled to find comfortable housing. He sleeps in a room with 11 other people in the eastern suburb of Montreuil. “It’s like if you don’t have papers in this county, you don’t have any value.”

Despite these challenges and his long shifts in construction work, Adama takes evening classes to learn French.

‘It’s revenge’

In January 2025, CNT-SO, which represents construction and cleaning workers, collectively resubmitted 13 dossiers to the Paris prefecture.

“The files are still blocked, despite the fact that I’ve re-applied for these 13 people,” Rahmani told Al Jazeera.

She suspects that the lack of response is a form of backlash, as the strikes unveiled poor working conditions in France in the lead-up to the Olympics.

“It’s revenge,” Rahmani said. “For them, the [striking workers] gave [France] a bad image, even if it’s the reality.”

The project developer and two subcontracting companies – which have not responded to Al Jazeera’s request for comment – have allegedly prevented some workers from returning to construction sites, meaning they have lost jobs and housing.

According to Adama, at least three colleagues have not worked since October 2023, and rely on charities to subsidise their food and housing.

“We have information that the company employing them did not reinstate them. It was a disciplinary measure against the strike in which they had participated,” Jean-Francois Coulomme, a representative of left-wing La France Insoumise party, told Al Jazeera. “It’s a strategy of ostracising these employees in particular.”

In February, Coulomme wrote to France’s interior minister via a government accountability mechanism on the “fate of the files submitted to the Paris Prefecture”, demanding “the legitimate regularisation of these workers”.

The letter remains unanswered.

“The arena workers’ case is representative of a systemic problem. It’s a good illustration of the fact that these workers are silenced due to the [precariousness] of their administrative situation,” Colomme said.

The CNT-SO union and so-called Gilets Noirs, or Black Vests – a collective of mostly undocumented migrants working to get administrative regularisation and housing rights for migrants in France – tried expediting the process through the city of Paris, as the city was one of the negotiating parties.

“We’ve plugged a few more holes by going through the mayor of Paris, because they’re the intermediary between our contacts and the Paris prefecture. We want to know what the situation is,” Doums, a spokesperson for the Gilets Noirs, told Al Jazeera. “Today, the situation is still, let’s not say totally blocked, but a bit blocked at the level of the prefecture.”

Colomme suggested the Ministry of the Interior is preventing the dossiers from being approved.

“The prefectures take their orders from the ministry. So as far as we’re concerned, the prefects simply apply the directives of the minister in charge,” Coulomme said.

Al Jazeera contacted the minister of the interior and Paris prefecture, but did not receive a comment by the time of publication.

The initially swift response and negotiations are a typical reaction when a city is scrutinised before major international events, but often there is no follow-through when the hype dies down.

“The state of exception that the Olympics bring can be really important for leveraging gains for workers,” Jules Boykoff, researcher and author of the book Power Games: A Political History of the Olympics, told Al Jazeera. “The key is to lock in those gains while the hot glare of the Olympic spotlight still shines in your city. After that, it becomes much more difficult to take advantage of that Olympic moment to make promises to these workers.”

This can be an opportune time for people to push for rights, but the Olympics and other major sporting events also open the door for exploitation, especially for people in precarious situations like undocumented workers.

“This is just one more egregious example of taking advantage of people to create a sporting event that claims to benefit the many but actually just benefits the few,” Boykoff said. “The Olympics tend to spotlight what we might call surplus populations – whether we’re talking about expendable athletes or expendable workers who make the Olympic spectacle possible.”

Rahmani said, “During the strike, all these people came and made big promises … These deputies and senators come to a demonstration or strike and make a commitment to regularise these workers, but in the end, there’s no follow-up, and they tell you that they have no power.”

‘This ideology is currently affecting our country as a whole’

For years, France’s government has hardened its stance against immigration.

In December 2023, the French Parliament passed a controversial immigration law that differentiates between foreigners “in a situation of employment” and those who are not. The measure made it more difficult to receive social benefits for out-of-work expatriates.

The new regulations have played out in workplaces.

Between 2023 and 2024, according to official figures, the number of undocumented workers who were regularised dipped by 10 percent. Deportations, on the other hand, rose by more than a quarter.

“This ideology is currently affecting our country as a whole, with an instrumentalisation of the migration issue, which means we’re taking a totally utilitarian approach,” Coulomme said.

On the ground, Doums said the Gilets Noirs have observed the same phenomenon.

“The political situation in this country concerning immigrants and foreigners is becoming increasingly complicated,” Doums stated. Still, he insisted the collective would keep pushing for their rights. “We’re not going to stop there. Even after regularising the 14 people, we’re not going to stop.”

Ukraine is at the most difficult point in its existential war since the full-scale Russian invasion began in February, 2022.

The United States has backed out of the alliance supporting Kyiv, reneging on a multiyear strategic agreement it signed with Ukraine last year.

Ukraine has been in a defensive posture for a year, and Russian attacks on Ukrainian soil are increasing.

Now, the US is forcing Ukraine to negotiate for peace from a position of weakness, while demanding payback for $135.7bn in military and financial aid.

Worse could yet come, warns Phillips O’Brien, head of the School of International Relations at St Andrews University and a leading analyst and commentator on Ukraine. The US could drop its sanctions against Russia and back out of NATO.

Al Jazeera spoke with him about why, despite these gloomy prospects, he believes Europe still has the capacity to keep Ukraine fighting, and could ultimately do much more to determine the outcome of this war – for the sake of its own security.

Al Jazeera: Can Europe, plus a few other nations like Japan and Australia, save Ukraine from a bad deal with US President Trump and Russian leader Vladimir Putin?

Phillips O’Brien: They can certainly keep Ukraine in the fight. A lot of it depends on what the US does. We have to be careful about that. If the US actually moves to fully backing Russia and provides Russia with a significant amount of intelligence and support, that will be really a problem for Ukraine and Europe.

But assuming, say, the US just pulls out and washes its hands of it, Europe has the resources to keep Ukraine going. It would require mobilisation, effort, a significant amount of commitment on Europe’s part. So far, they’ve not, I think, shown the united will to do that, but they certainly could do it if they wanted to. They have the money. They have the technological know-how. They even have the military equipment to make a significant difference.

Al Jazeera: So you believe that – intelligence aside – Europe and Ukraine can quite quickly develop the defence industrial base needed?

O’Brien: Ukraine’s already developing a lot of it, so what [Europeans] could do is help supercharge what the Ukrainians are doing in, say, UAV [unmanned aerial vehicle] production. The Russian military is not this unstoppable machine. I think we have to realise it is still a deeply flawed institution.

It’s been protected by the US in many ways throughout this war in the way that the US has aided Ukraine not to attack the Russian military machine in Russia, and that’s been a conscious choice of the US. Europe could actually change, if it wanted to, the way it helped Ukraine to free up Ukraine, to provide it more aid to attack Russian production or Russian military facilities in Russia.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says he aims to make 30,000 long-range drones this year and 3,000 cruise missiles.

That would be very impressive if they could get that money up and running, and that would, I think, put Russian logistics and military production under significant pressure.

Al Jazeera: What would be the potential consequences of crossing the United States and Russia if Ukraine and Europe really banded together and did all these things, given what you said before about the US not necessarily remaining a neutral party? 

O’Brien: If these tariffs [Trump announced on April 2] come into effect, it’s already going to be an economic war with Europe. One of the things it could fully do – I think in many ways it’s already done it de facto – is to say, ‘The US will have no role defending Europe under NATO Article 5’.

They could basically cut Europe off of the transatlantic alliance. I think the most dangerous thing for Europe in the immediate term is to end the nuclear guarantees, basically saying to Russia, ‘We’re not protecting Europe,’ which means Europe’s nuclear guarantee goes completely down to a very small number of French and British submarines.

Al Jazeera: But Putin has already made nuclear threats. He did it when he dropped the Oreshnik ballistic missile on Dnipro last November …

O’Brien: I don’t think anyone in Europe took [previous threats] seriously as a threat against Europe because of the US nuclear shield.

Al Jazeera: Is there a European deficit in intelligence capabilities?

O’Brien: Basically, much of European intelligence has been integrated with the US, and they had been provided a lot of information from the US, and the US has technological capabilities that they don’t have.

So right away, you’d have to rely on less good, less developed systems.

Al Jazeera: Would you, in this scenario of confrontation, expect pushback from within the United States or US forces in Europe?

O’Brien: Congress could try and force back at any time. The issue is the president’s commander-in-chief, and right now, the Republicans have no desire to stand up to him.

Al Jazeera: Why is it important for Europe to make that stand?

O’Brien: Because with the US out of the game, Ukraine becomes incredibly important to the future of European security.

If you take the US out, the state of Ukraine is absolutely, without a doubt, central to European security, because Ukraine is the difference, as Putin understands, between Russia being a threat to the continent or not.

If they can take Ukraine and rebuild in possession of Ukraine’s resources, one assumes subsuming Belarus as well, then they’re in a much better position. Who knows what happens with the populists in France or with the populists in other European countries. It’s a very, very dangerous situation.