Rising US-China trade tensions ‘couldn’t come at a worse time’: Iowa agriculture secretary

American farmers have already been hurt by retaliatory tariffs from the U.S.-China trade war, and the ratcheting of tensions once again is unfortunate and comes at a bad time, according to IowaAgriculture Secretary Mike Naig. “As we head into the 2018 harvest season for corn and soybean out here in Iowa, this escalation of the trade conflict really couldn’t come at a worse time,” Naig said in an interview on CNBC’s “Closing Bell.” On Monday, the Trump administration escalated the trade tussle with China by announcing tariffs of 10 percent on some $200 billion of Chinese goods. Those duties will jump to 25 percent on Jan. 1. Read more here.