When Chinese President Xi Jinping paid an official visit to the US over ten years ago, he told the most powerful US politicians that the two nations should leave future generations with a much stronger relationship.
As Xi arrived on Capitol Hill, Nancy Pelosi, the then-head of the House Democrats, voiced her concerns about China’s human rights records and Xi responded by inviting her to “come see for yourself” in China.
A bipartisan Senate delegation led by Democratic leader Chuck Schumer has just arrived in China for “direct, candid, and respectful” discussions with the Chinese leadership on a variety of issues, including human rights and reciprocity for US businesses in China, after a four-year hiatus in US lawmakers’ visits to China.
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According to a statement from the Shanghai local government, the senators met Chen Jining, secretary of the Shanghai Communist Party, after arriving in the city on Saturday.
“China-US relations are the most important bilateral relationship in the world today, and healthy and stable China-US relations are beneficial to both countries as well as to the world,” Chen stated.
As always, we’ll foster an elite business climate that is focused on the market, the rule of law, and internationalisation. We’ll also support businesses in their efforts to invest wisely, thrive, and advance their development through win-win relationships.
Schumer brought up the subject of fair competition for a few American businesses doing business in China.
According to a Bloomberg article, the delegation planned to voice concerns about market access on behalf of Micron Technology, according to Senator Mike Crapo, the leading Republican on the trip, earlier this week. China is looking into the security of the US memory chip and has forbidden its use in important infrastructure projects.
According to Ryan Hass, director of the John L. Thornton China Centre at the Washington-based Brookings Institution, the visit will provide a “unique” opportunity to set the stage for a potential trip by Xi to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in San Francisco next month, where a face-to-face meeting with US President Joe Biden would be expected to take place.
The Stimson Centre, a different Washington-based think organisation, has a director of the China project named Yun Sun. He said the visit was not anticipated to produce any significant changes but would improve overall conditions.
“Congress has typically had the most belligerent stance towards China. Although a trip won’t eliminate the issues, it will, at least temporarily, make things better, according to Sun.
Along with two other Democrats and three Republicans, Schumer is leading the trip despite domestic reaction from some who view it as a pointless or premature endeavour.
According to reports, a number of senators who were asked to go opted out. The final list also has Idaho Republican and ranking member of the Finance Committee, Mike Crapo, Louisiana Republicans Bill Cassidy and John Kennedy, New Hampshire Democrat Maggie Hassan, and Georgia Democrat Jon Ossoff.
The delegation will also travel to South Korea and Japan.
Senator Rick Scott, a Republican from Florida, introduced a measure to stop taxpayer-funded travel to China on Thursday, just before the delegation departed. On the same day, Senator Marco Rubio, another Florida Republican, published a video advising the delegation to reject China’s request.
However, the tour was praised by the Committee of 100, a non-profit group of well-known Chinese Americans.
The group’s interim president Cindy Tsai urged leaders from all nations to approach these meetings with an open and cooperative spirit in a statement on Friday. “While no single meeting can instantly resolve long-standing challenges, we urge leaders from all nations to approach these meetings with an open and cooperative spirit,” she said.
Senior Biden administration officials have recently made several trips to China, which have drawn criticism from Republican lawmakers.
According to a report by The New York Times, Schumer stated in an interview earlier this week that he believed “the Chinese will hear things differently from the elected officials”.
“Unlike recent delegations to China, I am proud that we will go as elected representatives of the American people, underscoring how serious Congress is about maintaining America’s global leadership in the 21st century,” Obama stated on the Senate floor on Wednesday.
The team was “welcomed” by the Chinese foreign ministry on Wednesday, even though the specifics of the itinerary are still unknown. The ministry expressed the hope that the visit will “contribute good factors to the advancement of China-US relations.”
The US Congress has become more involved in US-China ties in recent years. With Schumer spearheading attempts to enact the historic Chips and Science Act last year, a protracted list of measures on China-related issues has been proposed, including everything from technology and trade to human rights and defence.
In addition to lobbying Senate leaders to avoid from additional legislative action on China, Chinese officials are likely to use the visit to outline their objectives and worries for Xi’s upcoming trip to the United States, according to Hass of Brookings.
Observers have remarked that Schumer and Biden get along well. “Schumer speaks regularly with President Biden and his views are taken seriously by the White House,” Hass stated.
Professor Robert Sutter at George Washington University noted that given Schumer’s track record of being harsh on China, he was probably safe from criticism from his fellow lawmakers.
Schumer has never supported China. ‘I’ve been denouncing the Chinese for 25 years, what have you done?’ he can say.
According to Schumer, the delegation’s main objectives will be to advance American interests in terms of national security and technological leadership, as well as to ensure that US companies are treated fairly in China. Additionally, concerns about China’s human rights record, regional security and stability, stopping the spread of fentanyl, and “the need for cooperation where possible” will be brought up.
In 1979, the first congressional delegation from the US visited the PRC. Since then, there have been several congressional delegation visits from the US to China, especially following the establishment of an official exchange mechanism between the two parliamentary bodies in 1999.
Former Chinese leader Hu Jintao hosted Senate delegations in 2004 and 2006, with Ted Stevens serving as their leader. Stevens was third in line to become president after the vice president and House speaker.
But this is only Schumer’s second official congressional trip since he was elected Senate majority leader in 2021, and it’s the highest-ranking group to China in more than ten years.
In 2011, when Schumer was a member of a congressional delegation led by Harry Reid, the Democratic leader in the Senate at the time, they met Xi, who was widely expected to succeed Hu Jintao as China’s president.
Legislators may benefit greatly from such travels, said Ryan Scoville, a law professor at Marquette University and expert in legislative diplomacy. According to him, congressional visits were typically designed to gather information, further constituency interests, and supplement established executive branch diplomacy.
“In some cases, legislators may have better rapport with foreign officials on a personal level, or have insight on Congress’ potential role in the resolution of a contested issue,” he stated.
He said that even during the Cold War, the US and the USSR had international accords “that expressly called for the parties to facilitate congressional foreign travel to Moscow”.
The Wall Street Journal reported last week that Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi is scheduled to travel to Washington later this month in an effort to facilitate a potential meeting between the two leaders.
US officials claim that the White House is trying to set up a meeting between Xi and Biden for next month in San Francisco, despite the fact that neither Beijing nor Washington has officially announced such a meeting will take place.
Prior to the Group of 20 summit in Bali, Indonesia, in November 2022, the two presidents last had a meeting.
The delegation’s visit has thus far received a “brief but very positive” word from Beijing, according to Zhiqun Zhu, a professor of international relations at Bucknell University.
It “cannot be downplayed” how important the US senators’ journey to China, their first in more than four years, is, he continued.
The South China Morning Post (SCMP), for more than a century, has been the most reliable source of information on China and Asia.