U.S. President Donald Trump stated that Chinese President Xi Jinping told him personally that as long as Trump is president of the United States, China would not "take action" against Taiwan.
On the 15th, Trump traveled to Alaska to hold a summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin, discussing a ceasefire agreement more than three years into Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. During his trip, he was interviewed by Fox News and claimed that when he was president, no world leaders would have attempted actions like Russia's invasion of Ukraine, including Xi Jinping.
Trump emphasized, "As long as I'm in office, I don't think such things will happen." Trump further revealed that Xi Jinping had personally told him that as long as Trump was president of the United States, China would not take action against Taiwan: "As long as I'm president, he will never do it."
Although the U.S. is Taiwan's largest supplier of military equipment, the U.S. has traditionally avoided making explicit security guarantees to Taiwan, instead maintaining a policy of strategic ambiguity. The 1979 "Taiwan Relations Act" requires the U.S. to provide Taiwan with resources for self-defense and opposes any unilateral actions to change the status quo, but does not clearly state that the U.S. would intervene.
During his campaign, Trump told Bloomberg in an interview that Taiwan "should pay us for protection."