Spain’s economic endorsement of China is a major Trump rebuke

DESPITE being the eurozone’s fourth-largest economy and a major middle power, Spain rarely makes the world headlines. However, Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez’s recent trip to Beijing (Apr 11 to 15) represents perhaps the strongest European economic rebuke to US President Donald Trump since 2019 – when Group of Seven nation Italy signed up to Beijing’s Belt and Road infrastructure initiative.

It was only on Mar 3 that Trump threatened to put relations with Spain into a deep freeze. The US president declared in the Oval Office that “Spain has been terrible” over the Iran war, adding that the US did not “want anything to do with Spain”. He noted he had told US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent “to cut off all dealings” with Madrid.

Following Trump’s outburst, Bessent claimed trade embargoes could be enforced under the US International Emergency Economic Powers Act. He also asserted that Madrid’s attempts to forge closer trade relations with China were akin to “cutting your own throat”, warning that Chinese manufacturers would increasingly dump goods into Spain.