President Donald Trump said Monday that the European Union is "nastier than China" on trade.
Trump made the comments at the White House while also announcing an executive order targeting reducing prescription drug costs. His remarks also came hours after the U.S. and China announced a de-escalation of their tit-for-tat tariffs and a 90-day period to hammer out a trade deal.
"European Union is in many ways nastier than China, OK?" Trump said. "And we've just started with them. Oh, they'll come down a lot. You watch. We have all the cards. They treated us very unfairly."
U.S. exporters sent nearly $1 trillion of trade to the EU last year, more than twice what went to China, according to Axios.
The European Commission, the executive arm of the EU, last week announced a list of American products that could be targeted for tariffs worth more than $107 billion if trade talks with the Trump administration fail.
The EU's list included aircraft, cars, chemicals and plastics, agricultural products, and American spirits such as whiskey. The commission's proposed list totals $107.4 billion in countermeasures to Trump's tariffs on the EU.
"The EU remains fully committed to finding negotiated outcomes with the U.S.," commission President Ursula von der Leyen said in a statement. "At the same time, we continue preparing for all possibilities."
The commission said it will consult with member states before completing the list. The commission's announcement came the same day as Trump's announcement of a trade deal with the U.K.
In Monday's executive order, Trump set a 30-day deadline for drugmakers to lower the cost of prescription drugs and called on the Department of Health and Human Services, led by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., to broker new prices.
If a deal isn't reached, a new rule will kick in that will tie the price of what the U.S. pays for medications to lower prices paid by other countries.
"Europe's going to have to pay a little bit more. The rest of the world is going to have to pay a little bit more," Trump said Monday. "And America is going to pay a lot less."
Information from Reuters was used in this report.