President Trump's master plan to strengthen hemispheric defense—aimed at eliminating Chinese influence in the Panama Canal—appears to have hit a bottleneck at the end of last week.

A new report Saturday reveals that Hong Kong's CK Hutchison will not sign a deal next week to sell its two ports on either side of the canal to a BlackRock-led consortium. It's back to the drawing board for the Trump administration, which will now need to implement new tactics to pressure Panama to rid itself of Chinese Communist influence.

Sources told Reuters that Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing's deal to sell the Panama ports, including Balboa and Cristobal on either side of the canal, will not have the proper paperwork signed with the BlackRock-led investor group by the April 2 deadline for "obvious reasons."

Those obvious reasons include an infuriated Chinese Communist Party, which views Li as having bent the knee to Trump and the Americans by agreeing to give up such critical infrastructure around the canal.

For weeks, various Chinese media outlets called CK Hutchison's billionaire founder "spineless" and questioned which "side he should stand on." 

Another source said that talks are still very much underway regarding the $19 billion deal, which includes 43 ports in 23 countries. 

On Friday, the South China Morning Post first revealed that CK Hutchison Holdings "will not go ahead with the expected signing of a deal next week to sell its two strategic ports at the Panama Canal ... with Beijing saying it will launch an antitrust probe into the sale." 

In another report, The Telegraph noted, "Chinese authorities have effectively blacklisted CK Hutchison and the business interests of the Li family by telling Chinese state-backed firms they will struggle to get regulatory approval for any work involving the group."

And earlier this month...

It's crucial to understand that eliminating Chinese Communist influence from the Panama Canal is part of Trump's master plan to strengthen hemispheric defense. This strategy also encompasses developing hardened defense layers around Canada and Greenland. It includes efforts to purge Chinese triad gangs, Mexican cartels, and other terrorist organizations from the North American financial system as the world fractures into a bipolar state. 

If the communists in Beijing actually nuked the port deal with BlackRock. Then expect some angry Truth Social posts from Trump.