EXCLUSIVE: Republican Letter Asks Blinken to Visit Taiwan En Route to China

Secretary of State Antony Blinken delivers remarks at the SelectUSA Investment Summit in National Harbor, Md., on May 4, 2023. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)

A group of Republican lawmakers is urging Secretary of State Antony Blinken to visit Taiwan as he travels to communist China.

The lawmakers, led by Rep. Tom Tiffany (R-Wis.), say that the stopover is necessary to demonstrate that China’s communist regime cannot dictate the terms of U.S. alliances and partnerships, according to a copy of the letter obtained by The Epoch Times.

“As you prepare for your trip to the People’s Republic of China, we are writing to once again request that you consider adding a stopover in Taiwan to your itinerary,” the letter says.

“It would send a clear message that the United States does not need a permission slip from the Chinese Communist Party to meet with our friends and allies in Taiwan—or anywhere else.”

The letter, which was also signed by Republican lawmakers Buddy Carter (Ga.), Dan Crenshaw (Texas), Byron Donalds (Fla.), Nancy Mace (S.C.), Andy Ogles (Tenn.), and Scott Perry (Penn.), further encourages Blinken to assuage both Taiwanese and American concerns about delays in shipments of weapons to the island.

Taiwan Key to US Security in Indo-Pacific

Asked about the letter, Tiffany said the Biden administration needed to increase engagement with Taiwan or else risk damaging vital U.S. interests in favor of appeasing China without apparent benefit.

“Taiwan is a key U.S. economic and security partner in the region,” Tiffany told The Epoch Times.

“Avoiding high-level coordination and communication to try and appease Beijing doesn’t reduce tensions in the region, it only encourages more Chinese bullying and brinksmanship.”

The issue of U.S. communications with Taiwan has been a sticking point in Sino-American relations since then-President Richard Nixon first visited China in 1972.

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which rules China as a single-party state, claims democratic Taiwan is part of its territory. The regime has never controlled any part of Taiwan, but CCP officials have nevertheless vowed to start a war to ensure the island’s de facto independence is not recognized internationally.

Since 1979, the United States has maintained an uncomfortable balance in its relations with China and Taiwan.

On the one hand, the United States formally recognizes but does not endorse the CCP’s claims to Taiwan. As such, it does not maintain formal ties with the island government, though it does have deep economic ties there.

On the other hand, the United States does maintain legal obligations to sell Taiwan the weapons it needs to defend its de facto independence from CCP aggression. Washington also maintains agreements with Beijing that neither side shall attempt to unilaterally change this status quo.

Despite the lack of formal ties, the United States and Taiwan have enjoyed robust informal dialogues for decades. Tiffany believes the Biden administration is overly eager to appease the CCP by slowing down such informal ties.

“It has been U.S. policy for many years to encourage and facilitate meetings between senior U.S. officials and their counterparts in Taiwan,” Tiffany said.

“By ignoring that policy and operating under outdated, self-imposed restrictions, the Biden administration is allowing the CCP to dictate who American leaders can and can’t talk to, and that is wrong.”

The letter also encourages Blinken to visit Taiwan to assuage any unease arising from U.S. failures to deliver weapons systems that the island has purchased.

There is currently a $14 billion backlog of weapons systems that Taiwan has purchased from the United States but has still not received. Some of those orders go as far back as 2019.

For Tiffany, a Blinken stopover in Taiwan would greatly ease Taipei’s worries and could go a long way in creating transparency for Taiwanese and American officials regarding what the Biden administration is doing to solve the problem.

“Taiwan has demonstrated an enduring commitment to their own national defense through regular arms purchases, so when the deliveries of those systems are delayed, that’s deeply concerning,” Tiffany said.

“Policymakers on both sides of the Pacific deserve a clear explanation about what is holding up these transfers, and what the Biden administration is doing to solve the problem.”

L-R) Then-Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi participates in a ceremonial swearing-in with new Rep. Tom Tiffany (R-Wis.), with wife Christine, at the U.S. Capitol in Washington on May 19, 2020. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

Blinken Trip ‘Counterproductive and Dangerous’

Blinken is currently scheduled to meet with senior Chinese officials during a series of talks in Beijing on June 18 and 19. He will seek to reestablish regular communications between the United States and the CCP regime.

The visit is part of a larger effort by the Biden administration to erect guardrails around the two powers’ increasingly bitter competition, according to State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller.

“Intense competition requires intense and tough diplomacy to ensure that competition does not veer into confrontation or conflict, and that’s what we intend for this visit,” Miller said during a June 14 press briefing.

Miller added that Blinken would seek to achieve three broad objectives in Beijing: reestablishing normal communications, championing U.S. values and interests, and identifying potential avenues for mutual cooperation.

The visit comes during a CCP-imposed blackout of military-to-military communications between the two powers, which U.S. officials say risks a catastrophic miscalculation that could lead to conflict.

Some in Congress, like Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.), believe that the Blinken trip could do well in resetting those lines of communication and easing tensions.

“I hope that we can create some level of communication, particularly on the defense side, so that we can deconflict,” Menendez told The Epoch Times.

“Right now, the Chinese military leadership is unwilling to engage with ours, and that’s a problem, especially with the risky behavior that they’ve taken.”

Many in Congress, however, consider the administration’s push for talks without preconditions to be ill-advised, particularly given the rise in CCP military aggression in the region and the regime’s continued campaign of spying and repression against ethnic Chinese living in the United States.

Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.), who chairs the bipartisan Select Committee on the CCP, is among them.

“The attempts by the administration to revive engagement after it’s failed for 20 years, I just don’t know what that achieves other than to force us to slow walk certain defensive actions,” Gallagher told NTD, a sister media outlet of The Epoch Times.

“My view is [Blinken] shouldn’t be going right now, particularly in light of the revelations we saw last week about a CCP investment in Cuba for a massive spying station right in our own neighborhood.”

To that end, Gallagher said the Blinken-China visit would not do anything to meaningfully help the United States in its competition with China and could even set U.S. security back.

“Time and time again, engagement, particularly engagement just for the sake of engagement, has undermined the urgency we need to actually win the competition,” Gallagher said.

“The fact that the Biden administration is revising diplomatic and economic engagement as a core pillar of our grand strategy, I think, is counterproductive and dangerous.”

Others in Congress view the trip as a wasted opportunity. Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), for example, told The Epoch Times that Blinken’s visit had great potential but would likely amount to nothing more than the administration “kowtowing to China.”

“I hope that what [Blinken] accomplishes is he goes over there and tells them that the trade deficit is unacceptable. We’re not going to allow them to cheat anymore on trade, we’re not gonna allow them to steal our jobs, and we’re gonna get that deficit down to zero,” Hawley said.

“But that’s not what he’s going to do. He’s going to go over there and beg and grovel.”

A State Department official declined to comment on the letter, saying the department does not comment on Congressional correspondence.”

Jackson Richman and Melina Wisecup contributed to this report.