00:00It's okay it's okay thank you madam chair for your excellent leadership in
00:09holding this hearing and let me key in on Dr. Kwok's testimony when she talked
00:15about these ASEAN countries don't or Southeast Asian countries they don't
00:22want to be forced to choose they would donate this does corroborate some of the
00:27public comments and some of the analysis from our embassies when I traveled to
00:31Thailand Singapore Indonesia of the Philippines but you know privately in
00:36our meetings with our counterparts they do want to choose they want to choose
00:42the United States that has not changed from the Biden administration to the
00:46Trump administration I would argue especially Indonesia a vibrant democracy
00:52they want to choose they want to choose the United States and that hasn't
00:56changed from one administration to the other in fact I remember very vividly
01:00when we were in Jakarta hearing a very stern admonition from the foreign minister
01:12Marsudi how terribly upset the Indonesians were and others ASEAN country leaders
01:20were that President Biden skipped the ASEAN conference so this sense of a vacuum it's
01:29not unique to now it existed before the Trump administration I think I think it's
01:35not a change in policy on trade that has given us this challenge of needing to deepen our ties with them in fact I want to challenge
01:50the critics of the critics of the Trump administration's trade strategy a little bit when they claim that the president's efforts to negotiate more reciprocal deals are pushing ASEAN nations towards Beijing or making these nations more vulnerable to Xi Jinping's acts of coercion in fact what is the objective of the Trump trade policy it's actually to deepen our economic ties it's to reduce the trade barriers to American exporters and so if the end goal of this is more reciprocal of the trade
02:19between the United States and ASEAN this has enormous potential to reverse the sentiment expressed by Prime Minister of Foreign Minister Marsudi that that the Biden administration was not paying enough attention to ASEAN so so Ms. Weisel I totally agree with your testimony when you talk about a regional agreement that should consolidate and expand ASEAN commitments to eliminate tariff and non tariff barriers and goods and
02:49services across the region you say it also should require new commitments and trade remedies and then you say in exchange the United States should gradually eliminate tariffs on imports from Southeast Asian partners to the agreement that sounds exactly like the America first trade policy we're asking them to lower their trade barriers to American exporters and in exchange
03:19why does this not that why does this policy not create an opportunity for greater economic integration between the United States and ASEAN to the detriment of the malign influence of Beijing
03:30well as I said at the outset I think that they feel you know that the tariff threat hanging over them is a five alarm fire it has caused potentially tremendous damage to their economies with all of the uncertainty and the threats I think
03:49I think that all of the ASEAN countries do indeed want to engage more deeply with the United States they want to have greater economic cooperation but they want to do so as equal partners in this negotiation so as we look to see areas where we can cooperate they would like to see reciprocal access in other words they would take on the rules that we are pushing
04:14and in areas that we are pushing and in areas that are really important to us across the range of economic areas you know when we talk about customs and digital trade and all of these areas that are important to the United States but in exchange they would like something in return
04:33and I'm running out of time but I and I take your testimony in good faith that you you argue that the that the Trump Trump policy does have the opportunity to open up US exports to Southeast Asia but you still maintain that they will de-risk from the United States as a result of this we I'm not sure that's necessarily true if we get better more integrated economic deals as a result of the policy I think they will de-risk from China
05:00I don't have much time left but I would love maybe in a second round madam chair to talk about outbound investment into China and what's going to replace that if we restrict outbound investment in China does that create opportunities for a more US investment into ASEAN as a way to relocate supply chains
05:22my ranking member has just left for another engagement and I wasn't planning on doing a second round if you don't mind
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