George Soros offers rare praise to Trump on China trade war, urges Republicans to keep strong stand against Huawei

In a stunning turn of events, liberal billionaire financier George Soros praised President Trump for his policies on China in a Wall Street op-ed Tuesday, although he voiced concerns the commander-in-chief might undermine his own strategy later on. According to Soros, Trump's policy on China is "coherent and genuinely bipartisan" as well as “the greatest — and perhaps only — foreign policy accomplishment of the Trump administration."

The Hungarian-American investor said the Trump administration rightly deemed Huawei a national security threat by placing it on the Commerce Department’s “entity list”, which prevents American companies from doing business with the electronics giant. The 89-year-old said while China was “a dangerous rival in artificial intelligence and machine learning,” its ability to compete in the 5G spectrum was significantly affected owing to Huawei's dependence on U.S. businesses.

“As long as Huawei remains on the entity list, it will lack crucial technology and be seriously weakened,” Soros wrote. Nonetheless, Soros admitted Trump might remove Huawei from the blacklist as a concession to China as they try to reach a deal, which he believes is a huge possibility in the run-up to the 2020 election.

He noted that Trump has sought to block multiple amendments that were introduced in the House and Senate to prevent him from removing Huawei from the list. "It’s hard to know exactly what’s motivating Mr. Trump, but he appears desperate for a deal with President Xi to bolster the U.S. stock market and economy to improve his chances at re-election—putting his electoral interests ahead of America’s interests," wrote the 89-year-old billionaire. “If Republicans allow Mr. Trump to bail out the Communist Party-run telecom giant, they will be abdicating their most basic democratic responsibilities."

Huawei has been a longstanding concern for the U.S. after the company's apparently cozy relationship with the Chinese regime. It is feared China could use its technology to spy on the U.S. 

Earlier this year, the Justice Department filed criminal charges against the telecom equipment provider claiming it had committed fraud and stolen several trade secrets. Meanwhile, Huawei recently accused the U.S. government of interfering with its business using "unscrupulous" tactics.