That's considered candour from a Trump ally who is practiced by now at toeing the president's line.
Mr Mnuchin touted the phase-one deal Trump administration negotiators struck last week as "quite substantial" and "a fundamental agreement in principle," in a CNBC interview. But he offered this decidedly un-Trumpian assessment: That the matter remains "subject to documentation and there's a lot of work to be done on that front."
By contrast, Mr Trump has framed the fact the two sides didn't actually spell out and sign a document sealing the agreement as a mere detail.
But Mr Mnuchin's version of the state of play bears even less resemblance to the one offered by the Chinese. "One word has been suspiciously absent from China's media coverage of the trade talks with the United States over the past few days: deal," The Washington Post reported. "There has been a 'result,' there has been 'progress,' but there has been no 'deal.' "
