APEC Coming to Hawaii—AGAIN?

Reuters Oct 30, 2019:

… U.S. President Donald Trump said this week he hoped to sign an interim trade deal with Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping during the Nov. 16-17 Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Chile. Chilean officials said they cancelled the summit to focus on restoring law and order in the country.

The White House said afterwards the United States still expects to sign an initial trade agreement with China next month, but no alternate location had yet been set for Xi and Trump to meet….

The White House intends to offer some U.S. locations as alternatives for the APEC summit, according to one source familiar with U.S. thinking. Alaska and Hawaii could be potential options that would be acceptable to China, said a second source familiar with the issue.

The White House had no immediate comment on alternate locations. But trade experts said pulling together a replacement summit at short notice would be tough.

"These summits - especially one involving 21 leaders - are a massive undertaking, and moving one with two weeks' notice is all but impossible," said Matthew Goodman, a former National Security Council official and an adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank.

The White House is "clearly signaling that it really wants the Trump-Xi bilateral to go ahead," Goodman said. "But it seems more likely that they'll have trade ministers or ambassadors sign the 'phase one' deal and save the leaders' meeting for later."

China has suggested Macau as a possible venue, according to one China trade source familiar with the issue….

read … Chile's APEC cancellation raises new hurdle for U.S.-China trade deal 

B: Trump says China trade deal will be signed somewhere in US  

AP: Trump Absent, ASEAN Charts Path For Trade Bloc Led By China

2011: FT: Complacent Honolulu out of its league, not ready for APEC