Prince William Reporter

U.S. Rep. Rob Wittman (R-VA) said the Biden Administration's approach to meetings with China is ineffective and primarily geared towards mere appearances in an Aug. 25 press release. Wittman criticized what he said was a lack of substantive outcomes from these engagements, saying stronger meeting preconditions are needed to counter China's power dynamics.

"If you don't [set preconditions], then you are essentially going to be subservient to China—and that's exactly what they want," he said in the release. This is an opportunity for [the Chinese Communist Party] to show that they're in a position of power [and make it appear as if] the U.S. is in a position of weakness."

Wittman made his comments on 'Mornings with Maria' on Fox Business, discussing the Biden administration's China strategy failures and expressing criticism of Secretary Gina Raimondo's upcoming trip to China. Wittman highlighted the administration's struggle to project American strength to Chinese Communist Party officials, particularly due to the absence of robust preconditions in their approach.

Wittman expressed skepticism about the effectiveness of Secretary Raimondo's recent China trip, highlighting the absence of preconditions as a concern. Wittman stressed the importance of setting conditions like halting intellectual property theft and ensuring fair treatment of U.S. businesses to avoid appearing subservient to China and allowing them to demonstrate superiority. He suggested that without such preconditions, the Chinese Communist Party could exploit the situation to assert dominance while portraying the U.S. as weak.

"It doesn't seem like anything substantive comes out of these meetings," he said. "These are all for appearance, and I would argue it's to China's advantage for the appearance to be that our U.S. officials are going to China at the bequest of China. That's not the way to have the upper hand in these discussions or even to be on a level playing field in these discussions. No preconditions set, it seems like [the Biden administration is] doing everything [they] can to try to appease China instead of standing up to China."

Earlier this year, at The Hill's "The Future of Defense" event, Wittman criticized the Biden administration's proposed defense budget increase of three percent, saying it fell short of effectively countering the growing threat posed by China. He expressed concern about China's lack of transparency regarding defense spending and emphasized the urgency of addressing the imminent threat China poses, stating, "The threat is now... There is no question that the threat is at our doorstep."