House Speaker Kevin McCarthy met with Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen in California on Wednesday, becoming the highest-ranking U.S. politician to have met a Taiwanese leader on U.S. soil in decades. McCarthy stressed the need to accelerate the supply of arms to Taiwan in the face of growing threats from China.
McCarthy and other Republican and Democratic lawmakers met with Tsai Ing-wen at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, Calif., despite threats of retaliation from China, which claims autonomy from Taiwan as its territory.
A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman condemned the meeting, accusing the United States of “colluding with separatists” seeking “Taiwan independence” and saying Washington was violating its commitments to the island.
Tsai thanked Congress for its support for Taiwan and quoted former President Reagan telling McCarthy and other lawmakers of his belief that “to keep the peace, we must be strong.”
The meeting came at a time when US-China relations have deteriorated to what some observers say is the worst since Washington established diplomatic ties with Beijing in 1979, and concerns have grown among Western officials that the China may attempt to take control of Taiwan by force in the years to come.
China has pledged to take control of Taiwan and held military exercises around the island last August, following a visit by then-President Nancy Pelosi.
On Wednesday, Taiwan’s Defense Ministry said a group of Chinese aircraft carriers were in the waters off the island’s southeast coast ahead of an encounter between Tsai and McCarthy.
McCarthy called the friendship between the peoples of Taiwan and America “a matter of great importance to the free world”.
Speaking at a press conference with lawmakers who attended the meeting with Tsai, McCarthy said they discussed how to speed up arms deliveries to Taiwan.
“We must continue to sell weapons to Taiwan and ensure that the weapons reach Taiwan in a timely manner,” he said. “Second, we need to strengthen our economic cooperation, especially in trade and technology.”
Democratic Congressman Pete Aguilar said he looked forward to more such meetings in the future, while Republican Mike Gallagher responded to China’s objections saying:
“If a duly elected leader of one of our most important democratic partners cannot meet with American leaders on American soil, then we are just feeding the crocodile that will eventually eat us.”
Afterwards, Gallagher told reporters that he wanted to expedite the delivery of US Harpoon missiles to Taiwan.
At a press conference in Brussels, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said there was nothing new about Tsai’s shutdown in the United States, adding that all meetings were “private” and “unofficial”.
“Beijing should not use the shutdown (of Tsai Ing-wen in the United States) as an excuse for any action to increase tensions and further alter the status quo,” he said.
McCarthy said he currently has no plans to travel to Taiwan, but that doesn’t mean he won’t and China can’t tell him where he can go or who he can meet.
