WASHINGTON – House Speaker Kevin McCarthy announced Monday that he will meet with Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen in Southern California later this week, a move that has already drawn the ire of China.
McCarthy (R-Calif.) will host the “bipartisan meeting” with Tsai at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley as the self-governed island’s leader stops on a 10-day tour of the US, the speaker’s office announced.
The announcement was unwelcome news for Beijing, which considers Taiwan a breakaway province and whose President, Xi Jinping, has said his top priority is “reunification” with the island. Democratic Taiwan, however, claims independence from the larger nation.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning criticized the upcoming meeting, saying that Beijing “has repeatedly stressed [that] we strongly oppose any form of official interaction and contact between the US side and Taiwan authorities.”
“There is but one China in the world and Taiwan is an inalienable part of China,” Mao said. “Relevant US congressman needs to … refrain from sending wrong signals to ‘Taiwan independence’ forces and avoid undermining the China-US relations and peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait.”
The US currently observes a “One China” policy, which acknowledges China’s claims to the island, but considers Taiwan’s sovereignty status as unsettled.
Still, senior US leaders — including President Biden — have said Washington would come to Taiwan’s defense if China were to launch a military invasion.
Tsai reportedly met last week with the top House Democrat, Brooklyn and Queens Rep. Hakeem Jeffries.
McCarthy’s meeting with Tsai comes about eight months after then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi became the highest-ranking US elected official to visit Taiwan since then-House Speaker Newt Gingrich in 1997.
Pelosi went on that 19-hour trip despite White House warnings against traveling to the island for fear of riling Beijing and further damaging already simmering US-China tensions.
China responded to Pelosi’s visit by launching its largest military drills in more than 25 years.
For four days after Pelosi landed in Taiwan on Aug. 2, Beijing conducted air and sea exercises near Taiwan, including live-fire practice and missile launches.
Asked whether Beijing would undertake a similar military responses to Tsai’s upcoming meeting with McCarthy, Mao warned that China “will take resolute measures to safeguard its sovereignty and territorial integrity.”
Since Pelosi’s visit, tensions with China have only grown, with military-to-military communications shut off since the trip.
Diplomatic relations have also become frayed after Secretary of State Antony Blinken scrapped a planned trip to Beijing in late January after NORAD discovered China had launched a spy balloon into US airspace.