World
Trump Proposes Cooking Oil Ban; Beijing Pushes Back
By Jake Beardslee · October 16, 2025
Beijing Reaffirms Trade War Stance
China reiterated that trade conflicts offer “no winners” in response to a new U.S. threat over soybean purchases and cooking oil imports. ASON BEAN/RGJ / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images
Escalation Triggered by Rare Earths Dispute
Tensions rose when China introduced fresh export restrictions on rare earth elements on October 9—measures that the Trump administration claims violated prior tariff agreements. Gage Skidmore from Surprise, AZ, United States of America, CC BY-SA 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Trump Threatens to Halt Cooking Oil Trade With China
Facing a sharp drop in Chinese purchases of U.S. soybeans, President Trump threatened sweeping measures, including ending trade in cooking oil. “We are considering terminating business with China having to do with Cooking Oil, and other elements of Trade, as retribution,” he said, adding, “As an example, we can easily produce Cooking Oil ourselves, we don’t need to purchase it from China.” The White House / Wikimedia
China Counters With Diplomatic Appeal
At a routine press briefing, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian called for negotiations grounded in “equality, mutual respect, and mutual benefit,” and rejected U.S. tariff threats, according to the Global Times, a Chinese state-run publication. Aboodi Vesakaran / Unsplash
Beijing Rejects Sanctions, Vows Defense
Lin also declared: “China firmly rejects the recent U.S. restrictions and sanctions on China, and will do what is necessary to protect its legitimate rights and interests. Threatening high tariffs is not the right way to deal with China.” Igor Omilaev / Unsplash
Impact on U.S. Agriculture
Though once the largest buyer of American soybeans, China has purchased none from the current U.S. harvest. In 2024, China accounted for $12.5 billion of the U.S.’s $24.5 billion in global soybean exports. Kelly Sikkema / Unsplash
Voices from Farm Advocates
Jennifer Fahy, co-executive director of Farm Aid, in an interview with Newseek, warned that farmers face more than cyclical losses: “Farmers are suffering terrible losses… not economic blips, but potentially long-term or permanently lost markets due to ricocheting tariffs.” Steven Weeks / Unsplash