Walz’s China experience draws GOP attacks, but Beijing isn’t counting on better ties

WASHINGTON (AP) — Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz has a history with China. And Republicans are seizing on it.

At 25, Walz taught a year of high school in China. He returned for his honeymoon and many more times with American exchange students. As a congressman, he served on a committee tracking China’s human rights and met figures like the Dalai Lama.

Now that Walz is the Democratic vice presidential nominee, Republicans have accused him of a decadeslong relationship with “Communist China” and even opened an investigation. The attacks reflect how, amid a tense U.S.-China relationship, visits once seen as simple cultural interactions have become a target for political opponents. Ultimately, Beijing does not expect U.S. policy to thaw regardless of who is in the White House, experts say.

With competition defining Washington’s relationship with Beijing, any interaction with China appears to be “regarded with skepticism, if not outright suspicion,” and it’s become “a well-worn tactic to attack opponents simply for having a China line in their resumes,” said Kyle Jaros, an associate professor of global affairs at the University of Notre Dame.

“The assumption behind these attack lines is that having China connections makes individuals beholden or sympathetic to China and compromises U.S. interests,” Jaros said. “There is definitely such a thing as being too cozy with one’s geopolitical rival, but blanket China-bashing and excluding people with firsthand China experience from U.S. policymaking is also bad for U.S. interests.”

Republican Rep. James Comer, chair of the House Oversight and Accountability Committee, announced on Friday an investigation into Walz’s China connections, including the student trips he had organized. Comer said he asked the FBI for information on whether Walz could have targeted by or recruited for Beijing’s influence operations.

Walz’s “longstanding and cozy relationship with China” should be a concern for Americans, Comer said in a statement.

Walz spokesman Teddy Tschann pointed to the governor’s record in standing up to China’s Communist Party and fighting for human rights and democracy.

“Republicans are twisting basic facts and desperately lying to distract from the Trump-Vance agenda,” Tschann said.

Scrutiny started almost immediately after Walz was named Vice President Kamala Harris’ running mate in the November presidential election.

“Communist China is very happy with” Walz, Richard Grenell, former acting director of national intelligence in President Donald Trump’s administration, posted on the social media platform X.

Republican Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas wrote on X that Walz ”owes the American people an explanation about his unusual, 35-year relationship with Communist China.” Sen. Marco Rubio, a Florida Republican, called Walz “an example of how Beijing patiently grooms future American leaders.”

Walz was 26 when he returned from a one-year teaching gig in China. He spoke kindly of the Chinese people and said they had been “mistreated and cheated” by their government. He told the newspaper Chadron Record in his home state of Nebraska that he wished they had proper leadership.

Walz returned to China in 1994 for his honeymoon. He got married on June 4, the fifth anniversary of the bloody crackdown of the student-led pro-democracy movement in Tiananmen Square, which remains a political taboo in China.

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“He wanted to have a date he’ll always remember,” Gwen Whipple, Walz’s wife-to-be, told the Star-Herald of Scottsbluff, Nebraska, ahead of their trip.

Later, when Walz came to Washington as a Minnesota congressman, he became a champion for China’s human rights and served on a congressional committee that tracks the issue. He called a lunch with the Dalai Lama “life-changing.”

He also posed for photos with Hong Kong pro-democracy activist Joshua Wong, who testified before Congress in 2019 when the territory was engulfed in monthslong protests over an unpopular proposal to allow suspects to be extradited to China for trial that raised concerns about Hong Kong’s autonomy. Beijing sees the Tibetan spiritual leader and Wong as threats to its rule and disapproved of U.S. politicians meeting them.

In recent years, China has moderated its hopes for U.S. politicians with a history in the country, said Yun Sun, director of the China program at the foreign affairs think tank Stimson Center. That’s partly because they might know details of China’s internal problems, she said.

Walz’s knowledge could actually lend credibility to U.S. criticism of the ruling Communist Party, said Dimitar Gueorguiev, an associate professor of political science at Syracuse University.

He also shows “how it is possible to have China experience and human-level empathy while retaining moral clarity” about the Chinese government, said Jaros of the University of Notre Dame.

In China, the public has been curious about Walz’s experience in the country, but the government is tamping down discussions.

Alumni of Foshan No. 1 High School, the Chinese school where Walz taught in 1989-90, were asked not to post anything about Walz or accept media interviews, especially not with foreign journalists. The notice, posted to at least one alumni chat group and shared with The Associated Press, cited the “extremely sensitive” China-U.S. relationship, the anti-China consensus of both political parties and the need to “avoid unnecessary troubles.”

The nationalistic Chinese news site guancha.cn published an exclusive interview with Chen Weichuan, a retired English teacher from the school who was a translator between Walz and the principal and had taken Walz out for street food.

Chen described Walz as “very nice, easygoing and loved by students” and expressed admiration for Walz’s ascent from a teacher to governor and now vice presidential candidate. “He is remarkable,” Chen told guancha.cn.

Mao Ning, a spokeswoman for the Chinese foreign ministry, declined to comment, saying U.S. elections were a domestic affair.

Chinese President Xi Jinping has no illusion that Washington would soften its stance on Beijing, regardless of who gets elected in November, said Willy Lam, a senior fellow at the research institute Jamestown Foundation.

“They have stopped entertaining the aspect that individual politicians, individual CEOs might push the White House towards a more China-friendly policy,” Lam said.

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AP researcher Rhonda Shafner in New York and writer Elsie Chen in Washington contributed.