The State Department’s most senior official focused solely on China announced Wednesday that he’s stepping down at a tumultuous time in the US relationship with Beijing.
Rick Waters, head of the State Department’s recently created “China House,” told a staff meeting on Wednesday that he plans to leave his post at the end of June, according to State Department officials.
Waters has headed China House, officially known as the Office of China Coordination, since its creation in December last year and served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for China and Taiwan since June 2021. While rotating out of the China House position, Waters is remaining a career foreign service officer.
Waters’ departure is the latest in a series of recent changes to officials handling Washington’s fraught relations with Beijing. In February, the White House’s National Security Council announced the departure of Laura Rosenberger, the NSC’s senior director for China and Taiwan. Earlier this month, the State Department announced that Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman, who has led much of the US’s diplomatic engagement with China, intends to retire.
“Secretary Blinken has benefited tremendously from Rick’s expertise on China and Taiwan over the past two years and is grateful for his work establishing China House,” State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said in a statement.
Asked about reporting that the State Department held back export controls and human rights-related sanctions to try to limit damage to the US-China relationship after the US shot down an alleged Chinese spy balloon in February, a senior State Department official who spoke on condition of anonymity said the department didn’t pull its punches, but instead calculated its punches to land with maximum effect and bring allies along with US efforts.
President Joe Biden voiced optimism Sunday at the close of the Group of Seven summit that relations would “thaw very shortly.” In potential avenues to improve relations, or at least reduce tensions, Xie Feng arrived in the US on Tuesday to serve as China’s new ambassador. And China’s Minister of Commerce Wang Wentao is expected to meet this week with Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo in Washington and US Trade Representative Katherine Tai at an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation ministerial meeting in Detroit.
China House is made up of a staff of about 65, roughly triple the number of the China Desk it replaced. It includes officials on secondment from other State Department bureaus and federal government departments. It’s housed on the 7th floor of the State Department, together with the rest of the department’s leadership.
“China House is already a force multiplier for the Administration’s efforts to out-compete China and advance a free and open Indo-Pacific,” Kurt Campbell, deputy assistant to the president and coordinator for the Indo-Pacific, said in a statement. “Rick’s unique knowledge and experience consistently improved our policymaking.”
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