Trump Is, Was and Would Be a Gift to China

There is a curious cognitive dissonance in how a lot of us think about the last decade’s climate policies and this decade’s economic problems.

During the final years of the 2010s, the Trump administration proudly tore up dozens of policies meant to lower American greenhouse gas emissions and build a competitive domestic clean energy industry. It prioritized oil, coal and natural gas businesses over wind, solar and batteries, and as president, Donald Trump often seemed to revel in picking policies that would increase emissions by design.

These choicescame with costs: American automakers failed to make their cars more efficient, and within a few years, they had fallen behind their international competition, especially South Korean and Chinese automakers.

Today, the United States finds itself badly lagging behind China not just in hybrid and electric vehicles but also in many other crucial industries: solar, wind and battery production, as well as the refining of some minerals. China now makes more than half of the world’s electric vehicles, and BYD, the Chinese automaker, is expanding so quickly that it has