[dragonwriter]

> Could this be the same as a tit for tat measure like with tariffs?

It certainly hopes to provoke a cycle of retaliatory escalation, because it's an election year stunt looking to distract from, well, a whole lot of other things with a manufactured international crisis to create a rally-around-the-flag effect.

It will probably fail as a political strategy somewhat less spectacularly than “let’s avoid having a national strategy to control the COVID-19 pandemic and behind-the-scenes obstruct state efforts because the early impacts are in Democratic-governed states and we can leverage the impacts for political gains by blaming the governors.”

[onepointsixC]

And what will be the retaliation? China has already banned just about every major US equivalent. It's mind numbing how many people are crying about trade reciprocity finally reaching China.