The article is devoted to the study of the formation of the US foreign trade course in the Asia-Pacific region. Special attention is paid to the factors in bilateral relations with the TPSEP countries, which had a key influence on the decision of the George W. Bush administration to join the partnership. The author comes to the conclusion that failures in the implementation of the multilateral format of regional trade liberalization contributed to the fact that the United States entered the negotiation process on the TPSEP.