Part of that challenge stems from Biden’s promise to rebuild the American middle class — which could hamper efforts to push economic and trade policies that Asian countries would sign up to, said James Crabtree, a professor at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy in Singapore. “What the U.S. has done traditionally is, it’s tried to use both its security and economic power to entice allies into its camp. So for instance, it set up the original TPP trade agreement,” Crabtree told CNBC’s “Street Signs Asia” on Friday.
TPP refers to the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade pact negotiated by former President Barack Obama and 11 other countries — most of them in Asia-Pacific, which excludes China.
