After a series of foreign policy setbacks – from unsuccessful peace talks with Iran to the defeat of Viktor Orbán– U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance appears to have overlooked a potentially pivotal diplomatic moment – an upcoming meeting between Donald Trump and Xi Jinping that could reshape U.S.-China relations and carry implications beyond the Asia-Pacific, including for ongoing tensions involving Iran.
Vance has said little about China since his “Chinese peasant” remark last year and has absolutely not played a visible role in shaping a more approachable U.S. posture toward Beijing ahead of Trump’s visit to the country.
By contrast, senior officials in Trump’s cabinet have been signaling a softer approach to U.S.-China relations. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, long known as a China hawk during his years in the Senate, has claimed that Washington and Beijing had reached “strategic stability” and highlighted China’s important role in advancing a credible arms control framework. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, often seen as even more hawkish on China, has noted Beijing’s assurances that it is not supplying weapons to Iran. While neither has commented in detail on Trump’s anticipated visit to Beijing, their statements suggest an effort to lay the rhetorical groundwork for a potentially productive meeting.
Some may argue that Vance’s inaction on China simply reflects the limits of his office in foreign policy. After all, for much of U.S. history, the vice presidency carried little power or prestige. That reality, however, has changed since Vice President Walter Mondale, who played an unusually active diplomatic role and helped redefine the modern vice presidency, including through high-profile outreach to China.
Since then, vice presidents have frequently been tasked with important foreign policy missions involving Beijing. For example, Ronald Reagan assigned George H. W. Bush to help manage relations with Beijing, particularly during periods of tension over U.S.-Taiwan policy. In the Bill Clinton era, Al Gore visited China to promote environmental cooperation despite broader disagreements over human rights and campaign finance controversies. Under Barack Obama, Joe Biden engaged Chinese leaders to strengthen economic, security, and diplomatic ties, including efforts to secure Beijing’s support in preventing Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons.
These examples suggest that vice presidential engagement with China has become less an exception than a practical necessity. Yet Vance appears intent on breaking with that tradition. Some may interpret Vance’s reluctance to engage China as rooted in ideological hostility. After all, he has previously described China as the “biggest threat” to the United States and has consistently taken a hawkish stance toward the country. Nevertheless, if other prominent China hawks like Marco Rubio and Pete Hegseth can adopt more flexible rhetorical positions, there should be no reason for Vance not to do so.
A deeper explanation lies in Vance’s effort to position himself as the principal ideological heir of the MAGA movement, a political identity he may seek to carry into future presidential ambitions. However, that movement remains anchored in the instincts and political style of Trump, whose interpretation of “America First” increasingly emphasizes the willingness to use force whenever he deems it necessary, often with limited regard for alliances, long-term strategy, or global stability.
On the contrary, Vance’s own framing of “America First” leans a more restrained, quasi-isolationist posture: the United States should avoid overextension, conserve military resources, and limit involvement in regional conflicts in order to focus on long-term competition with China. From this perspective, even sending neutral, if not conciliatory, signals to Beijing – whether in the context of ceasefire diplomacy with Iran or ahead of a potential Trump-Xi meeting – risks appearing inconsistent with the strategic logic that underpins Vance’s approach.
As a result, Vance is practically shackled by his alignment with the MAGA movement: the more he signals ideological continuity with Trump, the less flexibility he has to adopt pragmatic diplomatic engagement with China along the lines of other senior officials. Notably, since the start of Trump’s second presidency, Vance has not held publicly reported meetings with senior Chinese officials – a contrast with Mike Pence, who met Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi just eight months into Trump’s first term.
MAGA’s growing divide over China is likely to make Vance even less inclined to take constructive steps on China, nor is he likely to be tasked with doing so by Trump. Now, he is held hostage by the political identity he projects as the personification of national conservatism, and as a result, he embodies a familiar condition of the vice presidency: visibility without meaningful influence. And on China policy, Vance may ultimately have less room for maneuver than even his potential 2028 Republican rival, Marco Rubio.
It is true that vice presidents must prioritize loyalty to their presidents, but they also need to function as “super-advisers” on foreign policy. Today’s U.S.-China relationship especially needs a vice president capable of serving as a stabilizing buffer between Trump’s volatility and Beijing’s tendency toward reciprocal escalation. Such a role does not necessitate a China specialist in the mold of George H. W. Bush or a seasoned foreign policy veteran like Joe Biden, but it does require the ability to operate beyond domestic ideological constraints.
Unable to break free from the ideological hold it has over him, Vance is not merely struggling to serve as the leading advisory voice within the administration – he appears increasingly incapable of fulfilling that role at all.
