(Bloomberg) -- Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te is considering trying to make a call to Donald Trump after his US election victory, according to people familiar with the matter, in a move that would likely be seen by Beijing as a sign of Taiwan seeking to assert independence.
This is unlikely to happen soon as a similar call between former President Tsai Ing-wen and Trump only took place a month after he won the 2016 election, one of the people said, asking not to be identified because the discussions are private. It’s unclear if Trump would take the call, another person said.
Lai has no plan to arrange a congratulatory call with Trump, the Presidential Office said in a statement on Thursday, adding that he had asked Taiwan’s representative office in the US to send a congratulatory message to the president-elect and Vice President-elect JD Vance.
Such a move would provoke China, which considers Taiwan part of its territory that can be retaken by force if necessary. It forbids contact between government heads and Taiwan’s leader, fearing it could imply sovereignty for the self-ruled island. China has used its economic influence to whittle away the number of countries that formally recognize the government in Taipei.
Asked earlier whether Taiwan is seeking to call Trump, Mark Chih-wei Ho, deputy secretary-general to the president, said the government would congratulate Trump on his victory.
“We will follow the usual practice to contact and congratulate him in the most beautiful and warm way,” he said.
World leaders congratulated Trump on Wednesday as he won the US election, capping one of the most tumultuous campaigns in modern political history to defeat his Democratic challenger Kamala Harris.
For China, the election of Trump may mean tariffs of as much as 60% on Chinese goods, a level that Bloomberg Economics says will decimate trade between the world’s biggest economies. That’s on top of a range of export controls on advanced technology.
The 2016 call between Tsai and Trump lasted for a little more than 10 minutes, and was the first between a Taiwanese leader and an incumbent or incoming US president in about four decades.
In recent days, top Taiwanese officials have made the case that a Trump presidency could bring “more pros than cons,” citing benefits from his proposed technology restrictions on China. On the campaign trail, Trump said Taiwan stole the US’s chip business and called for the island to pay for America’s protection.
(Updates with Taiwan statement in third paragraph. An earlier version corrected the wording in the second paragraph to clarify that no decision has yet been made.)
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