In remarks captured in a White House video, President Donald Trump said Tuesday, Oct. 20, that the United States and India were close to a trade agreement but gave no completion date or account of what remained to be settled.
Trump called the prospective accord “a much different kind of deal,” but did not explain what would make it different. He did not say whether he meant the Interim Agreement or the broader bilateral trade agreement.
The State Department said U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio met India’s External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar in Mumbai on Tuesday. The Associated Press reported that Rubio told reporters the countries were “about as close as you can be” to an executed agreement and had a small number of issues left.
The governments’ Feb. 6 joint statement announced a framework for an Interim Agreement and reaffirmed negotiations on a broader bilateral trade agreement launched Feb. 13, 2025. The framework was intended to lead to the Interim Agreement; the statement said the wider negotiations would continue.
Under the framework, India would reduce or eliminate tariffs on U.S. industrial goods and a range of food and agricultural products. The United States specified an 18% reciprocal tariff on listed Indian-origin goods. The statement made removal of that reciprocal tariff on a wider range of products conditional on successful conclusion of the Interim Agreement, naming generic pharmaceuticals, gems and diamonds, and aircraft parts among them.
India also said it intended to purchase $500 billion in U.S. energy products, aircraft and parts, precious metals, technology products and coking coal over the next five years. The White House fact sheet listed a wider negotiating agenda that included non-tariff barriers, services and investment, intellectual property, labor, environmental issues and government procurement. Trump gave no signing date, and the February joint statement set no new timetable.
