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Trans-Pacific View | Economy | Southeast Asia

US to Remove Vietnam From Export Control List, Government Says

The move is a sign of growing strategic trust, but trade is likely to remain a point of friction in relations between Hanoi and Washington.

U.S. President Donald Trump has removed Vietnam from a list of countries restricted from accessing advanced American technologies, the country’s government announced on Saturday.

To Lam, the head of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV), traveled to Washington to attend the inaugural meeting of Trump’s “Board of Peace” on February 19, and met with the U.S. leader the following day, the Government News website reported.

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U.S. President Donald Trump has removed Vietnam from a list of countries restricted from accessing advanced American technologies, the country’s government announced on Saturday.

To Lam, the head of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV), traveled to Washington to attend the inaugural meeting of Trump’s “Board of Peace” on February 19, and met with the U.S. leader the following day, the Government News website reported.

During the meeting, the report said, Trump told Lam that he would “instruct the relevant agencies to soon remove Vietnam from the strategic export control list.”

It specifically said that Vietnam would be removed from the strategic export control lists D:1–D:3, which would slow approvals for the export of goods with dual-use potential. These include items such as semiconductor tools, aerospace components, and certain types of software, among other things.

In his talks with Lam, Trump expressed support for deeper economic, scientific and technological cooperation between Vietnam and the U.S., while the Vietnamese leader called for “candid and substantive dialogue on outstanding issues” relating to trade.

Vietnam and the U.S. have been locked in trade negotiations since Washington imposed a 20 percent tariff on Vietnamese goods in August. The two countries held a sixth round of talks earlier this month, but are yet to reach a final agreement. It is unclear where all of this now stands after the Supreme Court ruled on Friday that most of Trump’s tariffs were illegal, leaving in place just the 10 percent blanket tariff that applies to all imports to the United States. The Trump administration has vowed to persist with its tariff policy one way or another, suggesting that Vietnam will remain the subject of special U.S. attention.

Despite the imposition of the 20 percent tariff on Vietnamese imports, Vietnam’s trade surplus with the U.S. remains one of the largest in the world. Vietnamese exports to the U.S. rose from $119.6 billion in 2024 to $153.2 billion last year, an increase of 28 percent, according to Vietnamese government figures. This has pushed the country’s trade surplus out to a record of nearly $134 billion in 2025, considerably higher than in 2024.

Specifically, the U.S.-Vietnam trade talks have reportedly become bogged down over the definition of “transshipped” goods from China, which Trump trade officials believe are to blame for the size of Vietnam’s trade surplus. The Trump administration says that these goods will be hit with a 40 percent tariff, but the two sides are yet to agree exactly how they will be defined, identified, and processed.

To help address American concerns, Vietnamese airlines this week announced nearly $37 billion in purchases. This included purchases by the national carrier Vietnam Airlines, which signed an $8.1 billion deal for around 50 Boeing 737-8 aircraft, and newcomer Sun PhuQuoc Airways, which agreed to buy 40 Boeing 787 Dreamliners with an estimated total value of $22.5 billion.

During his meeting with Lam, Trump said that he “highly valued Viet Nam’s efforts to balance bilateral trade” and expressed appreciation for the “valuable contracts” signed during Lam’s trip to Washington, the Vietnamese government stated.

The removal of Vietnam from the U.S. export control lists is a sign of the growing strategic trust between the two nations. However, given Vietnam’s structural position in the supply chains linking the U.S. and China, trade and tariffs are likely to be a primary point of contention between Hanoi and Washington for the remainder of Trump’s second term.

Sebastian Strangio is Southeast Asia editor at The Diplomat. 

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