Donald Trump has had a colourful presidency thus far, and while the coronavirus pandemic would’ve happened with or without him as president, he could’ve handled the whole situation a lot better. The same can be said for the protests and unrest erupting across the US. Trump displayed a glaring lack of leadership skills and it seems that China has picked up on it.
One of the most frequent arguments proposed by Trump is that China is rooting for Joe Biden to win the elections. It turns out that the sentiment in Beijing is actually the opposite. According to interviews with nine current and former Chinese officials, China now feels that Trump staying in power would benefit Beijing.
Yes, Trump has practically spent the last four years juggling between blaming the Democrats and China for all of America’s problems, but it seems that China has seen the bigger picture here. The way Beijing sees it, Trump’s continued erosion of America’s postwar alliance network will benefit China more than whatever continued trade disputes and geopolitical stability is going on between the countries right now.
According to Bloomberg, Zhou Xiaoming, a former Chinese trade negotiator and former deputy representative in Geneva says that “If Biden is elected, I think this could be more dangerous for China, because he will work with allies to target China, whereas Trump is destroying U.S. alliances,” Four current officials also believe in this stance.
That being said, China is not under the impression that a change in president will change the current relationship between the two countries. “Whether Trump wins, or Joe goes to Washington, things will get worse.” Zhou added.
How Trump is dealing with issues such as a surge in coronavirus cases, and protests against police discrimination is being monitored closely by China, who have finally realised that Trump’s long term impact on the US stability could very well be the best thing that’s happened to China in terms of Washington-Beijing relations.
The word on the street is that Chinese officials are of the opinion that a Democratic leadership will prove to be a more formidable opponent than a Trump led Republican one. While it does seem that the longer Trump is in office, the stronger China’s campaign to be the number one nation in the world is, only time can tell how the outcome of this one is.
