Ep. 44 – WITA’s Friday Exchange: Walking the Tightrope: China Summit Fallout, a Board of Trade, and What’s “Sensitive”?

Sara Schuman is a Managing Director at Beacon Global Strategies, where she leads the firm’s International Trade Practice. She brings unparalleled experience and insight at the forefront of U.S.-China trade relations, having served in senior U.S. government roles for more than a decade in Washington and Beijing.

Prior to joining Beacon, Schuman was the Senior Trade Representative for China at the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR), where she was one of the key U.S. officials responsible for trade negotiations with China and for developing and implementing U.S. trade policy toward China, including coordinating with U.S. trading partners and allies on economic security initiatives. She also served as Minister Counselor for Trade Affairs at the U.S. Embassy in Beijing during the first Trump and Biden administrations, acting as USTR’s envoy to the People’s Republic of China and the top U.S. trade official in the country. In that role, she was deeply involved in the Phase One Agreement trade negotiations and held broad responsibility for monitoring China’s implementation of its commitments under the agreement.

During the second Trump Administration, Schuman took part in multiple rounds of high-level negotiations with China and USTR’s review of China-related trade issues under the Presidential Memorandum on America First Trade Policy. She also has extensive experience with trade enforcement, including work on several World Trade Organization disputes against China involving rare earths, raw materials, aircraft, automobiles, aluminum, intellectual property rights, subsidies, electronic payments, and agriculture, and played a leading role in USTR’s Section 301 investigation of China’s technology transfer practices during the first Trump Administration.

Throughout her government career, Schuman worked extensively with other federal agencies, including the Departments of Treasury, Commerce, State, Agriculture, Energy, and Homeland Security. She was also detailed for one year to the U.S. House of Representatives’ bipartisan Select Committee on the Strategic Competition with China, serving as senior advisor on trade and economic security to the Ranking Member.

Schuman is fluent in Mandarin Chinese and has spent more than a decade living and working in China. Before joining USTR in 2013, she practiced law with an international law firm in New York and Beijing. She holds a J.D. magna cum laude from Brooklyn Law School, a B.A. cum laude in International Politics and Economics from Middlebury College, and a certificate in China Studies from the Johns Hopkins University Nanjing Center.

Kellie Meiman Hock is a Senior Counselor at McLarty Associates and an adjunct professor at Georgetown University. A long-time Latin America and trade policy hand, Kellie for over three decades has managed the most challenging issues confronting companies as they seek to manage global operations, tackle market access barriers, and grow internationally. She worked for nearly a decade as a U.S. Foreign Service Officer at the Department of State, serving in Bogota, Colombia, and throughout Brazil in Porto Alegre, São Paulo, and Recife. Her final posting was at the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative as Director for Brazil and the Southern Cone.

Kellie joined McLarty Associates in 2000, originally founding the firm’s trade and Brazil/Southern Cone practices and eventually becoming Managing Partner. She is now Senior Counselor to the firm and an adjunct professor at Georgetown University. She also guest lectures at University of Nebraska and McGill University. Kellie is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, chairs the Women’s Foreign Policy Group Leadership Council, and is on the board of the Inter-American Dialogue and the Washington Campus

Ed Gresser is Vice President and Director for Trade and Global Markets at PPI. Gresser rejoined PPI in 2021, after an earlier tour from 2001 to 2011. Before rejoining, he served from 2015 to 2021 as the Assistant U.S. Trade Representative for Trade Policy and Economics at the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR), where he led USTR’s economic research unit, oversaw the Generalized System of Preferences, and chaired the 21-agency Trade Policy Staff Committee.

Gresser began his career on Capitol Hill before serving at USTR as Policy Advisor to USTR Charlene Barshefsky from 1998 to 2001. He then led PPI’s Trade and Global Markets Project from 2001 to 2011. After leaving PPI, he co-founded and directed the independent think tank ProgressiveEconomy until rejoining USTR in 2015.

Gresser is a graduate of Stanford University and holds a master’s degree in International Affairs from Columbia University, along with a certificate from the Averell Harriman Institute for Advanced Study of the Soviet Union. He is the author of Freedom from Want: American Liberalism and the Global Economy (2007), has published in a variety of journals and newspapers, and regularly testifies before congressional committees on trade and global-economy topics. His research has been cited by leading academics and international organizations including the WTO, World Bank, and International Monetary Fund, and has been covered by outlets ranging from the New York Times and Washington Post to Vogue, NPR, CNN, Politico, the Wall Street Journal, and the Financial Times.

In 2013, the Washington International Trade Association presented Gresser with its Lighthouse Award, given annually to an individual or group for significant contributions to trade policy.

Joe Damond’s career spans more than 40 years in both the government and private sectors in Washington. He served 16 years as a trade official at the Department of Commerce and the Office of the United States Trade Representative, holding a diverse set of responsibilities across that time.

Most notably, Damond spent seven years as Deputy Assistant United States Trade Representative for Asia and the Pacific, where he was responsible for executing U.S. trade policy with Southeast Asia and the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum. He served as chief negotiator of bilateral trade agreements with Laos and Cambodia, as well as the historic Bilateral Trade Agreement with Vietnam, concluded in 2000, and also chaired the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Committee on Trade and Investment.

Damond then spent more than 20 years in the private sector, holding senior positions in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries focused on international trade, health policy, and global government affairs, representing the sector during numerous bilateral and global trade agreements. For the past four years, he has worked as a consultant on healthcare and trade policy issues, representing both private sector and government clients with a focus on Asia and Europe.

Damond is the author of Give Trade a Chance: The Negotiation of the U.S.-Vietnam Bilateral Trade Agreement.