KMT chairwoman finalises June US trip as Trump-Xi summit looms

KMT Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun is finalising a US trip for early June, planning meetings with congressional members, think tanks and Taiwanese diaspora groups across at least four American cities, the party’s US representative confirmed on Sunday.

The visit, expected to last about 10 days, follows Cheng’s trip to China in April, when she became the first Kuomintang chair to meet a Chinese president in a decade. She sat down with Xi Jinping in Beijing on April 10 for talks she framed as an effort to reset cross-strait relations. It also lands in the shadow of the Trump-Xi summit, where Iran war pressures have already pushed tariff and rare earth talks down the agenda and the fate of jailed Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai is expected to feature.

Cheng says the trip will present what she calls a new direction for cross-strait relations, one she argues would also serve US interests. “Taiwan should not have to choose between China and the US,” she said when she first announced the trip in late April, describing the island as no longer wanting to be a “chess piece” for Beijing. In an interview with CNN published Sunday, she argued the island “can embrace both powers” ahead of the summit between President Trump and Xi.

But Cheng was equally clear about the American alliance. She described Taiwan no longer needing the US as “impossible” and said she would discuss strategic issues she called “much larger and much more critical” than the stalled defence budget that has frustrated Washington. Taiwan, she added, “should not be a bargaining chip for China” in the Trump-Xi talks.

Chin Jih-hsin, the KMT’s representative in the US, said Cheng had received invitations from congressional members, think tanks and “overseas Taiwanese groups.” The itinerary includes New York, Boston, San Francisco and Los Angeles, four cities with large Taiwanese diaspora populations, with a possible stop in Texas. In Boston, Cheng will visit Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The trip’s duration depends on the number of events scheduled in each city and whether she adds stops in major southern US cities. Cheng has previously said she wants to arrange meetings with senior officials in Washington, DC, to explain the content of her discussion with Xi and exchange views on mutual concerns. Chin did not confirm whether State Department meetings had been secured.

The visit comes amid acute US pressure on Taipei to accelerate defence spending. Secretary of State Marco Rubio warned on May 5, a week before the Trump-Xi summit, that nothing should “destabilise” Taiwan or the broader Indo-Pacific region. The Pentagon has separately explored ways to bolster Taiwan’s defences, including fast-tracking certain weapons transfers. Cheng’s message, that Taiwan can manage its relationship with Beijing without choosing sides, cuts against the prevailing view in Washington that Taipei must invest far more in its own deterrence.

Domestic calculations

Cheng’s China visit divided Taiwanese public opinion. A Brookings Institution survey conducted April 16-22, within a week of the Xi meeting, found 47 per cent of respondents viewed it negatively against 35 per cent who saw it positively. Among Democratic Progressive Party supporters, the response was overwhelmingly negative, while KMT and Taiwan People’s Party voters were far more favourable. Independent voters split roughly 60-40 in favour.

The same survey found KMT voters largely believed the trip would help Taiwan’s economy and security, while DPP voters saw little benefit on either dimension. Independent voters, the authors noted, evaluated the meeting positively overall but were “overwhelmingly neutral” on concrete gains. They appeared to value the symbolic engagement over measurable outcomes.

Within the KMT itself, the base does not “necessarily endorse” Cheng’s approach, the Brookings researchers wrote. The most politically attentive respondents were the most likely to answer “don’t know,” an indication the party is still weighing its chairwoman’s diplomatic strategy.

Cheng has framed her US outreach as complementary to her China engagement, not a hedge against it. Advancing ties with Beijing, she said, does not mean “turning our back on the US.”

What happens next

The trip is not yet locked. Cheng has been in discussions with US counterparts and cannot yet confirm whether she will meet State Department officials. How warmly Washington receives a Taiwanese opposition leader who met Xi Jinping two months earlier will test the proposition that Taiwan can, as Cheng insists, embrace both powers without being squeezed by either.

For Beijing, a KMT chairwoman making the case directly to American audiences that closer Taiwan-China ties need not threaten US interests could prove a useful channel, particularly as the Communist Party pursues what analysts describe as a patient, multi-track reunification strategy. For Washington, the visit offers a read on the KMT’s political viability ahead of Taiwan’s 2028 presidential election. The Brookings authors concluded that if Xi endorses the KMT, that alignment “is likely going to become the defining issue” of the contest.