SNA (New York) — Republican lawmakers in the US House of Representatives are calling for increased confrontation with China, and should this party take power in next week’s midterm elections, they may exercise significant influence on US foreign policy in the Asia-Pacific region.

House of Representatives Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, who is leading the Republican effort, has promised to convene a committee expected to hammer the Biden’s administration for its allegedly “soft” stance on China.

“Countering the Chinese Communist threat is the single-most pressing issue we can undertake in this Congress,” he declared.

McCarthy has also specifically accused China of “monopolizing supply chains, unleashing a pandemic that devastated our economy, and continuing to engage in industrial espionage and theft of our intellectual property.”

The Republican leader states that his planned committee will “advance legislation that will help our national security, protect our economic prosperity, and that will hold the Chinese Communist Party accountable.”

In September, House Republicans introduced proposed legislation called the Taiwan Policy Act, which would deliver to the self-governing island US$6.5 billion in “arms conducive to deterring acts of aggression.” The bill also calls for “strategic clarity” which would commit the US government to a military response in the event of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan, overturning decades of “strategic ambiguity,” which was partly aimed at discouraging Taipei from declaring independence.

Aside from the high-profile August visit by House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a number of Republican lawmakers have also made pilgrimages to Taipei in recent months. A couple of weeks ago, Representative Mike Waltz of Florida traveled to the island and met with Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen. On Twitter, he declared that Beijing is “[building] up its military and [threatening] Taiwan’s democracy.”

Of course, Republicans lawmakers have not been alone in taking hawkish stances toward Beijing.

Pelosi’s visit, together with five of her Democratic Party colleagues, represented a provocation from the other side of the aisle. While meeting with President Tsai, Pelosi herself appeared to abandon the traditional US policy of strategic ambiguity when she declared her intent to “make crystal clear that America stands with the people of Taiwan.”

President Joe Biden, too, has repeatedly made statements suggesting that he is dropping ambiguity policies–although these words have usually been quickly followed by assurances that “nothing has changed” in the traditional US stance.

There has been bipartisan support for legislation aimed at countering Chinese economic influence, including the Chips and Science Act as well as America Competes Act, both of which passed this year.

But a Republican-dominated House of Representatives–which polls suggest is a more likely election result than Democrats holding the chamber–is widely expected to push the Biden administration more strongly in the direction of confrontation with Beijing.

As Semafor journalist Morgan Chalfont recently noted, “some worry a competition between parties to reflexively out-hawk each other on China issues will produce bad policy outcomes.”

In McCarthy’s case, he made his view clear that, in his opinion, the America Competes Act did not go nearly far enough. He dubbed it the “America Concedes Act” and even implied that it was somehow designed to aid China.

“Almost every page of Democrats’ 3,000-page ‘America Concedes Act’ has a provision that helps China but hurts America,” he declared this February on Twitter.

However, not all House Republicans will automatically line up behind McCarthy in his effort to make anti-China sentiment a political wedge issue.

For example, Illinois lawmaker Adam Kinzinger, despite having himself signed statements in the past denouncing Beijing’s “malign behavior to achieve world dominance,” has become increasingly outspoken against the influence of “the MAGA wing of the party.” Kinzinger and some other House Republicans will likely urge their party leadership to maintain a bipartisan approach toward China policies.

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