Nancy Pelosi’s Taiwan trip left a fuming White House scrambling for a plan

Before Nancy Pelosi landed in Taipei for a controversial meeting with President Tsai Ing-wen, the White House was careful not to weigh in on the trip, stressing that the speaker of the House makes her own decisions.
But behind the scenes, officials in President Joe Biden’s adminration were fuming at her insence on using the trip as a capstone for her career at a moment of highly delicate relations with Beijing.
In an effort to quietly persuade Pelosi to delay the visit, the White House dispatched senior members of the National Security Council, as well as State Department officials, to brief the speaker and her team on the geopolitical risks, people familiar with the conversations said.
When it became clear that Pelosi could not be swayed, the adminration instead planned for contingencies, setting up a scramble to ensure communication channels with Beijing were functioning and any fallout could be minimised.
That included meetings between US officials and their counterparts at the Chinese embassy in Washington, people familiar with the matter said. They were granted anonymity to discuss the private deliberations.

I led a Congressional delegation to Taiwan to make crystal clear that America stands with the people of Taiwan – and all those committed to Democracy and human rights.
Check out this video of our horic visit to Taipei. pic.twitter.com/TON6zB3x4s
— Nancy Pelosi (@SpeakerPelosi) August 3, 2022
But even as they tried to convince Pelosi’s team that now was not the right time to go, adminration officials knew they had to plan for the possibility that she would do so and gird for any Chinese response.
The inability to persuade Pelosi to postpone adds another complication for an adminration that is still figuring out its approach to China. And it left Biden officials in the uncomfortable position of being upstaged one of the most powerful House speakers in modern times, who has never shied away from poking China and isn’t afraid of upsetting anyone that gets in her way.
When Chinese officials in Beijing summoned the US ambassador to lodge a formal protest, Nicholas Burns reiterated the Biden adminration wanted to avoid any escalation and was intent on keeping all lines of communication open, according to a State Department spokesperson.
Pelosi’s trip came as she’s expected to soon wind down her horic career as the first woman House speaker. While she is likely to be re-elected to her San Francisco House seat, Republicans appear poised to capture the chamber’s majority and Pelosi cut a deal in 2018 with younger House members agreeing to leadership term limits.

Our delegation had the dinct privilege of meeting with the President of Taiwan @Iingwen today.
We discussed how America & Taiwan can deepen our economic ties, further strengthen our security partnership & defend our shared democratic values. pic.twitter.com/VL509UYK4x
— Nancy Pelosi (@SpeakerPelosi) August 3, 2022
Pelosi, 82, valued the discretion of her members about the trip and was especially displeased with leaks her team believed to come out of the Biden adminration in an effort to make her cancel the visit, people familiar with the matter said.
An NSC spokeswoman said allegations that the adminration purposefully leaked it are false. NSC spokesman John Kir on Tuesday called them “unfortunate,” noting that the speaker should be able to travel on her own terms.
Information about the visit was tightly held, kept even from lawmakers accompanying Pelosi. They didn’t receive the complete itinerary for the trip — including confirmation of the Taiwan stop — until the day they left and only after the delegation had boarded the plane.
The trip initially was to occur in April, but was postponed when Pelosi tested positive for Covid-19. Pelosi’s office continued to make clear to members who were to be on that trip that it was merely on hold.

As House Speaker Pelosi visited Taiwan, White House national security spokesman John Kir said the White House ‘will not engage in sabre-rattling’ but that the U.S. is prepared to ‘manage what Beijing chooses to do’ https://t.co/fe1iv8oqjN pic.twitter.com/PHIsGcU31W
— Reuters (@Reuters) August 3, 2022
Communications between the speaker’s team and the White House were fraught, with tension added when Biden in late July told reporters that the US military was opposed to Pelosi’s then unconfirmed travel plans.
The more the adminration tried to weigh in behind the scenes, the more Pelosi dug in.
At one point, her team suggested she might consider delaying the trip if the president publicly asked her to. Biden advisers didn’t believe that was a good idea, not least because they were unsure that she would comply, people familiar with the exchange said.
After days of treating the travel plans as a hypothetical, on Monday, White House officials changed their tone. Before Pelosi landed in the region, Kir warned Beijing not to overreact to a potential Taiwan stop or use it as a pretext to increase tensions.

On Tuesday, when she landed and China issued threats of military drills around the island, Kir repeated his warnings and said the US was prepared to manage whatever Beijing chooses to do in response.
The White House declined to say whether the president personally supported the speaker’s trip and whether he believes it benefits US foreign policy objectives.
Biden this year said he would support military intervention if China invaded Taiwan — a comment that was quickly walked back and clarified his advisers. People familiar with the internal deliberations, however, said the president was probably speaking his mind then, while stressing that it would have no impact on the longstanding One China Policy.
Steely resolve
US officials have spent the past 19 months carefully trying to recalibrate the relationship with China away from the unpredictability of the Trump adminration. They’ve emphasised the need for clear communications to avoid unintended consequences or a misunderstanding that could lead to conflict.
In her less than 24 hours on the ground, Pelosi also met with human rights and business leaders. Her message, she said, was unwavering support for Taiwan in the face of Beijing’s threats.
The trip was consent with her political brand, which she has built on her steely resolve to stand up to bullies. Throughout her career, she’s taken a tougher stance on China than virtually any of the US presidents she’s dealt with.