The midterm elections in the United States have ended, and the Democratic Party has taken control of Congress. Analysts pointed out that the election results gave the Democratic Party the power to obstruct President Trump's foreign policy, which is both an opportunity and a challenge for China, the United States' number one competitor.
Agence France-Presse has sorted out three key variables regarding how the midterm elections will impact the bilateral relations between Washington and Beijing:
1. The tariff war is constrained, but the Democratic Party is in a dilemma
As the U.S.-China trade truce is about to expire in January next year, the Democratic Party has regained control of Congress, giving it the ability to limit Trump's power to impose abusive tariffs on Chinese products during the remaining two years of his term. Wu Xinbo, dean of the Institute of International Studies at Fudan University in Shanghai, pointed out that if the Democratic Party restricts Trump, it means that it will be more difficult for him to use the tariff card in negotiations with China.
However, Democrats must also weigh the popularity of tariff policies with corporate America. Drew Thompson, a senior fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS) at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, said that although Congress will block Trump's policies in the next two years, it must still step by step in further restricting tariffs because tariffs are extremely popular among labor unions, blue-collar workers and small businesses, and these groups are the traditional vote base of the Democratic Party.
Patricia Kim, a foreign policy researcher at the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank, also believes that if increasing pressure on China would increase costs for American consumers or trigger conflicts, Congress would be unlikely to support it.
2. The Taiwan issue has become “the key to subverting the rules of the game”
Neil Shearing, chief economist at Capital Economics, bluntly said that the Taiwan issue may be a "game changer." In May of this year, Trump claimed that arms sales to Taiwan could be used as a "bargaining chip" in negotiations with China, raising questions about the U.S. stance. The $14 billion arms sales to Taiwan was also shelved by the White House.
Schilling warned that if Beijing determines that Washington is distracted by domestic affairs, it may use the remainder of Trump's term to increase pressure on Taiwan. Wu Xinbo predicted that the new Congress controlled by the Democratic Party may force Trump to resume arms sales to Taiwan next year, but this move will also destabilize U.S.-China relations.
Steve Tsang, director of the China Institute at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, put forward another view, believing that Congress’s support for Taiwan will instead become a strong incentive for Beijing to “play the safety card” on the Taiwan issue. However, Tang Anzhu reminded that although Congress can pass a bill requiring Trump to approve arms sales, the president still retains the power to "veto" or even "directly ignore" it.
3. Will Beijing regard Trump as a "lame duck"?
Analysts point out that even though Trump is politically weakened by the midterm elections, Beijing is unlikely to change its strategy of cooperating with him. Jin Peiya said that Beijing may continue to win over Trump through leadership-level contacts with Xi Jinping, and sees this as the lowest-cost way to manage U.S.-China relations, because neither side currently seems to expect or seek a fundamental improvement in bilateral relations.
Eric Tsang believes that China will take advantage of Trump's status as a "lame duck" to put more pressure on him. But he stressed that the Beijing authorities would not push Trump too hard to avoid triggering him to commit completely irresponsible behavior.
