Whether it’s Vice President Kamala Harris or some other official in Joe Biden’s Cabinet, it’s become painfully obvious that it is filled with diplomatic amateurs who seem to specialize not in negotiations but faux pas.
The latest to prove this is Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, who is being ripped to shreds by critics after she bowed repeatedly to her Chinese counterpart — who himself stood tall and did not reciprocate.
“Never, ever, ever,” a senior staffer for former President George W. Bush, Bradley Blakeman, told the New York Post. “An American official does not bow. It looks like she’s been summoned to the principal’s office, and that’s exactly the optics the Chinese love.”
In the video footage, Janet Yellen was observed bowing her head and leaning forward multiple times in quick succession, while the Chinese Vice Premier, He Lifeng, remained upright and shook her hand, Newsmax noted.
“Bowing is not part of the accepted protocol,” China law and government expert at NYU Jerome Cohen told the Post.
It got worse from there, however. During the opening of the inaugural economic summit between President Joe Biden’s administration and China’s Xi Jinping, Janet Yellen, who is 76 years old, inadvertently referred to He Lifeng as “Vice Premier Hu.”
“I strongly believe that the relationship between our two countries is rooted in the solid ties between the American and Chinese people,” Yellen said in a prepared statement she read, running her finger along the text as she read, according to The Post. “It is important that we keep nurturing and deepening these ties.”
Former Vice President Mike Pence told Newsmax last week he was “not surprised” Yellen was headed for a “kowtowing” session in China on behalf of the Biden regime. “The borrower has to talk to its lender,” he told host Tom Basile.
It was a sweeping criticism of the Biden administration for permitting China to retain a significant portion of America’s debt, while not exerting sufficient pressure on Beijing regarding other crucial matters.
“We also face important global challenges, such as debt distress in emerging markets and developing countries and climate change,” Yellen said. “We have a duty to both our own economies and to other countries to cooperate.”
Other experts noted Yellen was entirely too submissive, both in word and deed.
“The way to treat an adversary is, you don’t go hat in hand,” Blakeman told the Post. “But with this administration, time and time again, we embarrass ourselves and show weakness. And it just shows the lack of effective leverage we have.”
