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effectively. Furthermore, any attempts to reorient the agency and make it a weapon with which to fight against China are going to fail. Economic fights and national security fights are not won with subsidies.

THE CASE FOR THE EXPORT-IMPORT BANK Jennifer Hazelton

n 1986, President Ronald Reagan signed a bill extending the charter of the

Export-Import Bank (EXIM) by an additional six years. Ina signing statement attached to the bill, the President declared that “[t]his sends an important signal to both our exporting community and foreign suppliers that American exporters will continue to be able to compete vigorously for business throughout the world.”**

As acandidate for President, Ronald Reagan was opposed to EXIM, but as President, he learned the challenges America’s businesses face when competing for opportunities overseas, and his position on EXIM evolved. As President Reagan once famously remarked, “Why would I want our businesses competing with two hands tied behind their backs?” On January 30, 1984, the President said, “Exports create and sustain jobs for millions of American workers and contribute to the growth and strength of the United States economy. The Export-Import Bank contributes in a significant way to our nation’s export sales.”

President Reagan was exactly right. EXIM provides a mechanism that American companies can use to vie for projects that would otherwise be out of reach, notably deals that the banking industry won’t finance because of the risk associated with the host country or because the host nation itself requires a sovereign guarantee in order to submit a bid. EXIM is the only American vehicle that can provide that sovereign guarantee.

Since Reagan’s presidency, the global economic order has shifted dramatically, and arising China has completely disrupted the export credit sector.

• In Reagan’s era, export credit financing was a means for nations to compete for and win projects overseas in order to create more jobs at home. It was a benign tool for economic expansion. China, however, has morphed export credit financing into a weapon of national security.

• Where most nations have just one export credit agency (ECA), China has three, all targeted for specific stages of economic and industrial development. The amount of money China has put behind these three instruments is staggering.

• = Itis estimated that in 2018, China provided more than $500 billion in export

credit, approaching in that one year the total amount of financing EXIM has provided in its 90-year history.