It all goes back to 2001.
President Trump has had a busy few days.
First, Trump went full-on Trump at the G7 summit, hurling insults at Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau and getting into a photo-worthy showdown with other world leaders. Then The Donald had a much friendlier meeting in Singapore with the North Korean dictator, a man who is responsible for countless human rights violations and atrocities including mass extermination, murder, enslavement, torture, rape, forced abortions, disappearances and brutal executions.
The whole thing was mind-boggling.
But as Matt noted on Tuesday, now that Trump is back in Washington he's facing an ongoing challenge that he can't ignore: China. And things are heating up.
As soon as Friday, Trump could issue tariffs on $50 billion worth of Chinese goods. Trump's been talking about doing this for months now, and on May 29, he even ordered officials to come up with a finalized list of China-made products that would be hit with a 25 percent tariff.
Given the insanity of the past few days, at first glance it might seem like this is another case of Trump acting off the cuff. But in reality, this showdown with China is years in the making — and all comes back to China's unchecked theft of intellectual property (IP).
We explain the whole situation in the video below, which we hope you watch and share widely. It's important to remember that while Trump's brashness often dominates the debate, there are real consequences to China's IP theft that simply aren't going to go away on their own.