A new threat to relations between America and China 

As Xi Jinping tries to ease tensions, a congressional committee risks exacerbating them

THERE HAS been a lull in the rancour between China and America in recent weeks. Fears of a war over Taiwan, though still widespread, have ebbed since Presidents Joe Biden and Xi Jinping met in Bali in November and agreed to resume high-level dialogue in less sensitive areas, including climate change. Their senior economic officials had “frank exchanges” in Zurich in January but agreed to enhance communication. And both sides seem keen to build on that momentum when Antony Blinken heads to China in early February on the first visit there by an American secretary of state since 2018. 

But a fresh challenge to those efforts is now emerging in the shape of a new Republican-led congressional committee that will investigate many of the most divisive areas of China-America relations. The House of Representatives’ new China Select Committee has no legislative authority but can issue subpoenas and hold hearings. “There is bipartisan consensus that the era of trusting Communist China is over,” Kevin McCarthy, the new Republican speaker of the House, told legislators on January 10th, shortly before they approved the new committee by 365 votes to 65. Mike Gallagher, the committee’s chairman, says that he wants to hold its first hearing by March, “at the latest”.