Lutnick says he could hear ‘expletives’ out of Korea following trade deal with Japan

WASHINGTON — U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said Thursday that he could hear “expletives” out of South Korea after Japan reached a trade deal with U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration earlier this week. Lutnick made the remarks, apparently suggesting that the tariff deal between the United States and Japan might have created a sense of urgency for South Korea, which seeks to reach a deal to avoid or lower the Trump administration’s 25 percent “reciprocal” tariff set to kick in on Aug. 1. “I could hear the expletives out of Korea when they read the Japanese deal because the Koreans and the Japanese … they stare at each other,” he said in a CNBC interview. “So you can imagine what they were thinking when they saw that Japan made that deal … They were like, ‘Oh man!,” he added, underscoring that Koreans “very much” want to make a deal. On Tuesday, Trump announced the deal with Tokyo that would lower the threatened 25 percent reciprocal tariff for Japan to 15 percent in return for Japan’s agreement to invest US$550 billion in the U.S., increase U.S. rice imports by 75 p

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