By Michael Martina and Patricia Zengerle
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -A majority of the U.S. Senate on Tuesday backed one-time U.S. Senator David Perdue to be ambassador to China, a position the former business executive assumes amid a deep strategic rivalry and blistering trade war between the two countries.
As voting continued, the tally was 64 to 27 in favor of confirming President Donald Trump’s nominee Perdue, who was a Republican U.S. senator from Georgia from 2015 to 2021 and previously lived in Hong Kong during a 40-year career as a business executive.
Though a critic of China and its ruling Communist Party, Perdue has faced some pushback over his business track record of supporting offshoring U.S. jobs to countries with lower labor costs, a practice Trump has railed against for hollowing out America’s manufacturing base.
Last year, Perdue condemned Chinese President Xi Jinping as a “modern-day emperor,” writing in an essay that Beijing wanted to “destroy capitalism and democracy” and the U.S.-led world order.
In nominating Perdue, Trump had said he would be instrumental in implementing a “productive working relationship with China’s leaders.” During his confirmation hearing in early April, Perdue said the U.S. approach to China must be “nuanced, nonpartisan, and strategic.”
(Reporting by Patricia Zengerle and Michael Martina;)
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