President-elect Donald Trump has offered Terry Branstad the ambassadorship to China after huddling with the long-serving Iowa governor Tuesday in New York.
At an event shortly after the news was first reported by Bloomberg Wednesday morning, Mr. Trump said Branstad was well-versed in US-China relations and trade, telling reporters that the governor “knows them all.” China’s foreign ministry, too, responded warmly to the selection.
“First of all, I would like to say that Mr. Branstad is an old friend of the Chinese people and we welcome him to play a greater role in promoting Sino-U.S. relations,” ministry spokesman Lu Kang said at a daily news briefing.
The announcement comes only days after the president-elect reportedly angered Beijing by speaking with Taiwain’s president, Tsai Ing-wen, a break of nearly four decades of US diplomatic protocol.
The call between Mr. Trump and Ms. Tsai was the first known contact between a president or president-elect with a leader of the island since at least 1979, when the U.S. government severed diplomatic relations with Taiwan, which mainland China considers a rebellious province.
The White House responded by saying there was no break in “long-standing cross-Straits” protocol and it remained “firmly committed to our One China policy.”
While the U.S. continues to formally recognize the One China policy (read five disparate interpretations of the policy here), in which the federal government recognizes Taiwan as part of China under the Taiwan Relations Act, it practices a delicate de facto “Two China” policy: Taiwan is the United States’ ninth-largest trading partner, including the sale of military arms.
