(Washington D.C.)- In response to the United States Treasury Department's release today of its Semiannual Report on International Economic and Exchange Rate Policies, U.S. Rep. Sander Levin (D-MI), a senior member of the House Ways and Means Committee, offered the following remarks:

"Once again, the Bush Administration is doing too little, too late. As the U.S. trade deficit with China piled up, the Administration failed at every opportunity to shrink this growing figure.

"The United States is paying a high price for our government's failure to act from the very beginning, setting an increasingly damaging precedent of simply a 'wink-and-a-nod' instead of pursuing concrete action of any kind.

"We followed the same policy of complacency as Japan manipulated its currency. Currency manipulation is one of the most serious issues facing our manufacturers, including the automotive industry, when they export to China, as has been true with Japan.  As the Administration's meeting with the Big Three draws near later this month, this report's key findings send the wrong message to our automotive industry.  In the face of increasing and record-breaking trade deficits the Administration should not continue to sit on its hands while China's currency appreciates at a rate that is less than a snail?s pace -- it must act."

In 2005, the United States' $202 billion trade deficit with China accounted for 28 percent of the overall $724 billion deficit, and was a 25 percent increase from the U.S.-China bilateral trade deficit in 2004.
 

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