CHINA/NATIONAL SECURITY/TECHNOLOGY/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “President Trump moved on Wednesday [5-15-19] to ban American telecommunications firms from installing foreign-made equipment that could pose a threat to national security, White House officials said, stepping up a battle against China by effectively barring sales by Huawei, the country’s leading networking company. Mr. Trump issued an executive order instructing the commerce secretary, Wilbur Ross, to ban transactions ‘posing an unacceptable risk’ but did not single out any nation or company. The action has long been expected and is the latest salvo in the administration’s economic and security battle with China. It is also the most extreme move in the Trump administration’s fight against China’s tech sector. The executive order was ‘agnostic,’ White House officials said in a call with reporters, declining to single out China as the focus. ‘This administration will do what it takes to keep America safe and prosperous and to protect America from foreign adversaries’ targeting vulnerabilities in American communications infrastructure, the White House press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, said in a statement.”
–Cecilia Kang and David E. Sanger, “Huawei Is a Target as Trump Moves to Ban Foreign Telecom Gear,” The New York Times online, May 15, 2019