Susan Thornton is a retired senior American diplomat who for decades was at the US State Department where she worked on United States policy in Eurasia before becoming acting assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs during the Trump presidency. She is the director of the Forum on Asia-Pacific Security at the National Committee on American Foreign Policy and a senior fellow at the Paul Tsai China Centre, Yale Law School. For other interviews in the Open Questions series, click here.
How do you expect the different outcomes of the US presidential election to affect US-China relations?
It seems clear that with [Democratic candidate Kamala] Harris, there would be general continuity with Biden administration policies toward China. This means maintenance of established communication mechanisms, as well as competitive policies.
