Xi Presses Taiwan at Trump Summit as Taipei Fears Policy Shift

Taiwan has become the most sensitive item on Xi Jinping’s agenda as Donald Trump heads to Beijing next month, and Taipei fears the island may be treated less as a policy principle than as leverage in a wider deal. For 23 million Taiwanese, the meeting could shape not only diplomacy but the military balance in the western Pacific and the confidence of allies watching how far Washington will go.

Xi handled the issue differently when he met Trump in South Korea last year, setting Taiwan aside. This time, Beijing is expected to press much harder. Wu Xinbo, dean of Fudan University’s Institute of International Studies, argued that if Washington does not want war over Taiwan, it should not support Taiwan independence and that Trump should make clear he will not encourage separatism. Beijing’s foreign ministry has kept up the pressure, calling Taiwan China’s “core of core interests” and warning that “Taiwan independence” and peace in the Taiwan Strait are “as incompatible as fire and water.”

Taipei is bracing for the possibility that Trump, who is known for transactional diplomacy, could soften or reframe long-standing U.S. policy in exchange for Chinese purchases of U.S. aircraft or farm goods and some easing of economic pressure. Deputy Foreign Minister Francois Wu said Taiwan was trying to avoid being “on the menu” at the summit, a blunt sign that officials in Taipei see the island as a potential bargaining chip, not just a symbolic talking point.

Washington’s formal position places sharp limits on how far any shift can go. The State Department says U.S. policy is guided by the Taiwan Relations Act, the three Joint Communiques and the Six Assurances. It says the United States does not have diplomatic relations with Taiwan but maintains a robust unofficial relationship. The American Institute in Taiwan remains the main channel for U.S. government interaction with Taipei, and even a subtle change in wording could ripple through military planning, trade policy and alliance politics across the Indo-Pacific.

Those stakes are already visible in Taiwan’s defense debate. On April 27, the top U.S. diplomat in Taiwan urged the opposition-majority legislature to pass a “comprehensive” defense budget, citing integrated air and missile defense systems and drones as critical needs. President Lai Ching-te has proposed an eight-year special defense budget of about NT$1.25 trillion, or roughly US$40 billion, from 2026 through 2033. At the same time, Taiwan’s semiconductor industry keeps the island central to global supply chains, making any change in U.S.-China-Taiwan tensions matter far beyond the Taiwan Strait.