China Focuses on Kamala Harris’s Weaknesses After Biden Exits

(Bloomberg) — China officially avoided commenting on Kamala Harris’ late entry into the US presidential race. But state-backed news outlets and social-media users cast her as a weak vice president whose candidacy didn’t present a major threat to the world’s No. 2 economy.

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The Global Times, a Communist Party-backed media outlet, cited Chinese experts who called Harris’s performance in the White House “mediocre” and claimed she lacked the “experience and achievements to serve as president.” Another state-run outlet highlighted Donald Trump’s campaign trail claim Harris would be “easier to beat” than the sitting president.

“Does this mean Trump is set to win?” one person asked on China’s X-like Weibo, where the “Biden exit” hashtag garnered some 490 million views as citizens tried to parse what the shift meant for the Asian nation. An online poll of 12,000 users of that platform found nearly 80% believed the Republicans would now prevail in the November vote, without portraying that as a negative outcome.

Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning on Monday sidestepped a question about President Joe Biden’s decision to withdraw from the 2024 race and endorse his running mate, calling it a “domestic affair.” “We will not comment on that,” she said at a regular briefing in Beijing.

Most analysts agreed Harris would, at least initially, bring continuity on trade and foreign policy, meaning little impact for Beijing on the switch-up in the likely Democratic candidate.

“There is a well-established strategic continuity that is driving the US position right now,” said Josef Gregory Mahoney, a professor of international relations at Shanghai’s East China Normal University. “And at the level of whether it’s Biden or Trump or Harris, it’s really just a matter of style.”

Fundamentally, the next president has to represent the economic and strategic interests of the United States, he added.

Tensions between the world’s largest economies have flared in recent years over China’s military aggression toward Taiwan and Washington’s campaign to cut Beijing off from high-tech chips. While Biden used a meeting with President Xi Jinping in San Francisco last year to steady ties, fresh American complaints about a surge in cheap Chinese exports are adding friction to the relationship.

Vice President Harris has only met Xi on the sidelines of a summit in Thailand, and hasn’t visited Beijing in her current role. While Biden is set to be the first US president since Jimmy Carter not to travel to China while in office, he’s repeatedly touted spending “more time” with Xi than any other world leader at “about 90 hours.”

Former prosecutor Harris will need to quickly build trust with national security advisors to guide her on China policy, said Drew Thompson, a senior fellow at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy in Singapore.

“Harris does not have a track record on China, and it is not an area she is particularly comfortable,” added the former Pentagon official. “Biden has keen instincts and long-standing relationships with world leaders including Xi Jinping, but Harris does not.”

One asset she could leverage is Californian governor Gavin Newsom, whose trip to China last year won praise inside the Asian nation for bringing a more constructive message of cooperation than visits from other Biden administration officials.

While Chinese citizens touted Newsom as a Biden replacement after the president’s bad debate performance, the Californian has backed Harris for the ticket. “Tough. Fearless. Tenacious,” he wrote of the vice president on his official X page. “No one is better to prosecute the case against Donald Trump’s dark vision.”

Newsom in a senior cabinet role could help Harris harness the rapport he’s established with Chinese leaders. Both Democrats built their careers in California, the only US state to send a governor to Beijing for a meeting with Xi during Biden’s term and one with strong business ties to the Asian nation.

The vice president’s public comments display a willingness to uphold the current administration’s tough stance on trade, which has seen Biden build on tariffs imposed by Trump. Those curbs have been justified as necessary for protecting both national security and American jobs.

Following a summit of Southeast Asian countries in Indonesia last year, Harris said there was a need to protect American interests and ensure “we are a leader in terms of the rules of the road, as opposed to following others’ rules.”

During that event, she slammed Beijing for “bullying” citing its attempts at controlling access to the South China Sea, where China has sweeping claims of sovereignty. Harris also visited Palawan in the Philippines, an island close to an area that’s in heavy dispute between China and neighboring countries.

The vice president’s foreign policy overall is expected to align with Biden’s, especially regarding China, according to Zhu Junwei, a former researcher in the People’s Liberation Army who is now director of American research at Grandview Institution.

“The two parties don’t have much difference on China,” she said of Republicans and Democrats. “On China they’re quite the same.”

–With assistance from Josh Xiao, Colum Murphy, Rebecca Choong Wilkins and Lucille Liu.