Trump’s Chinese interference claims ‘reveal huge crisis facing American democracy’
The US president’s allegations are campaign rhetoric and not likely to affect ties with Beijing, according to a leading political scientist
Zheng Yongnian, a leading political scientist, said the claims were campaign rhetoric for November’s midterm elections and were unlikely to have a significant impact on the China-US relationship.
Instead of repeatedly shifting blame onto other countries, Washington should reflect on how to reform its own democracy, he said in an interview.
During a prime-time address from the White House that lasted nearly 30 minutes, Trump accused China of interfering in the 2020 US presidential race – which he lost to Joe Biden – and orchestrating “what is believed to be the largest compromise of election data in history”, which he claimed had led to the “illicit acquisition” of 220 million US voter files.
The US president also argued that intelligence documents had revealed “shocking vulnerabilities” in the country’s election infrastructure, leaving it exposed to “hacking, exploitation, and foreign interference”.
“If US elections can be so easily interfered with by other countries, then there must be something wrong with the electoral system and even the democratic system of the US,” said Zheng, dean of the school of public policy at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen. “I do think that American democracy needs to have changes.”