Tom Cotton, a Republican senator from Arkansas, slammed President Biden as the White House cut the video feed of a Taiwanese minister speaking during a democracy summit.
America did not invite China to the democracy summit, but cutting the live video feed during Taiwan’s turn depicts a “pathetic weakness” of the administration towards the China-Taiwan issue, experts believe.
Pathetic weakness: Tom Cotton asked Biden to apologize
The GOP senator noted he doubted that cutting off the video feed was a technical mistake.
Calling it “pathetic weakness” of the Biden administration, Cotton noted the US should protect Taiwan’s autonomy by maintaining the status quo in the region. China is trying to challenge Taiwan’s sovereignty and using force by skipping any sort of negotiations.
Asking Biden to apologize for the unfortunate episode, Cotton said people responsible for this should be accountable and fired. Similarly, he asserted the United States should help Taiwan by equipping them with missiles and aircraft to save the country from the invasion of communist China.
WHAT?
The White House cut the video feed of Taiwan’s Digital Minister during the Summit of Democracies.
Why?
Because Audrey Tang’s slide show displayed 🇹🇼 in a different color than 🇨🇳
This is insane. https://t.co/DMyRIFBLRG
— Michael Sobolik (@michaelsobolik) December 13, 2021
A reporter asked Cotton if the United States could afford another war by helping defend Ukraine and Taiwan from Russia and China, respectively.
The senator responded that while the US does not want a war, we must help the oppressed countries through logistics and military supplies so they can defend their territories themselves.
Recently, Tom Cotton also lambasted the president for not boycotting the 2022 Beijing Olympics in its entirety. Cotton noted the administration should not send US athletes to the event.
The Biden administration should ban all the US corporations from sponsoring any activity of the Olympics if the country really means business.
White House stopped displaying videos showing China and Taiwan in a different color
According to the Reuters news agency, the video feed showing Taiwan’s digital minister, Audrey Tang, representing her country during a panel discussion was shut down; only the audio was displayed.
During her presentation, a world map was shown designed by Civicus, a South African NGO. This categorized countries according to the openness of civil rights by showing them in different colors.
Taiwanese Digital Minister Audrey Tang showed a map during last week’s Summit for Democracy that not only showed China and Taiwan as separate countries but also said China was “closed” and that the island was “open" politically.https://t.co/c4EnlVwQCO
— Washington Examiner (@dcexaminer) December 14, 2021
Taiwan was the only regional country shown in green color, suggesting the country is open with regard to these rights. However, other countries, including many participants of the same summit, were shown in different colors, which represented statuses like “repressed,” “narrowed,” and “closed.”
Reportedly, the White House National Security officials had grave concerns about the map; the slide did not appear in the testing run of the presentation before the actual summit.
A disclaimer tried to clarify the US’ official stance later on, which noted on screen that all views presented by the panelists are personal opinions and did not reflect the US government’s official position.
Last month, the Chinese president warned Biden in a virtual meeting the US must not play with fire by supporting Taiwan.
