Pentagon is making plans for Speaker Kevin McCarthy to visit Taiwan

The Pentagon is making preparations for new House Speaker Kevin McCarthy to visit Taiwan later this year.

McCarthy is planning to visit Taiwan in the spring, people directly involved in the talks told Punchbowl News.

Reports of the impending trip comes as House Republicans plan to make countering China a major focus of their new majority in the lower chamber.

Last year in the midst of the 2022 midterm elections, McCarthy said that he would fly to visit Taiwan if he became House Speaker amid criticism of then House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s plans to visit the island nation.

One of the first actions in the 118th Congress was to establish the House Select Committee on Strategic Competition between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party.

Representative Mike Gallagher of Wisconsin will serve as chairman.

Texas Congressman Michael McCaul, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, will also serve on the panel.

‘The Select Committee will continue the critical work we began in the House China Task Force and shows that the Republican House is laser-focused on the CCP as an existential threat to our nation,’ McCaul said of the new committee. ‘The Select Committee is also an opportunity for House Democrats to finally join bipartisan efforts to counter the CCP, which they declined to do on the China Task Force.’

A possible trip to Taiwan, an island in East Asia, would need considerable security planning and preparation for any possible response from China.

McCarthy supported his predecessor Nancy Pelosi’s historic trip to the country when she visited last year – even as it heightened tensions between Beijing and Washington. 

The former Speaker of the House of Representatives flew to Taipei on a US Air Force jet in August 2022 along with five other members of Congress.

Pelosi made headlines on her trip when she accused China of ‘standing in the way’ of Taiwan’s participation in international affairs and cautioned that America’s commitment to preserving democracy ‘remains ironclad’.

Nancy Pelosi flew to Taiwan last year and met with the country’s female president Tsai Ing-wen, saying the US ‘will not abandon its commitment’ to the island

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, left, and Taiwanese President President Tsai Ing-wen, right, greet each other during a meeting in Taipei, Taiwan

During last years’ trip, Nancy Pelosi accused China of ‘standing in the way’ of Taiwan’s participation in international affairs and cautioned that America’s commitment to preserving democracy ‘remains ironclad’.