At a lively holiday banquet in Taipei in December 1978, hosted by the American Chamber of Commerce, then-U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of China Leonard Unger received a cable that would upend China-U.S. relations and reshape the United States’ approach to Taiwan. The message: President Jimmy Carter would sever formal diplomatic ties with Taipei and recognize the People’s Republic of China, effective on January 1, 1979. Unger scrambled across Taipei to wake President Chiang Ching-kuo and deliver the news in person.
That night helped spark the lasting diplomatic workaround that has defined Taiwan-U.S. relations for the past 45 years: the creation of the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT), a quasi-governmental entity designed to manage unofficial ties. It worked – sort of. But the diplomatic improvisation of 1979 no longer meets the demands of 2025. As Taiwan-U.S. coordination grows more complex and strategically consequential, it’s time to move beyond bureaucratic ambiguity. The United States must clarify who leads this effort – and ensure that both the executive and legislative branches share responsibility for it.
On May 5, U.S. Senators Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) and John Curtis (R-Utah) reintroduced the Taiwan Relations Reinforcement Act, which would elevate the director of AIT, Taipei (AIT/T), to a position requiring Senate confirmation. It’s a long-overdue proposal. However, one key role is missing from the bill and U.S. foreign policy discussions on Taiwan: the chair of AIT, Washington (AIT/W). Congress should require Senate confirmation for this role and clearly define its responsibilities, along with those of the AIT/T director, in statute. Doing so would reinforce the bipartisan commitment of the executive and legislative branches to Taiwan, eliminate internal ambiguity that slows execution, and provide future presidents with the bureaucratic clarity and institutional structure needed to respond decisively in a Taiwan contingency.
Based in Washington, the AIT/W chair is the lead coordinator of U.S. Taiwan policy. The chair oversees a wide range of activities, including arms sales, foreign military financing, interagency coordination, and congressional engagement. This role connects the White House, the National Security Council, the State and Defense Departments, Congress, and the defense industry with their counterparts in Taiwan. And yet, despite its growing significance, like the AIT/T director, the AIT/W chair remains unconfirmed, unmentioned in U.S. law, and ill-defined. It is time for Congress to amend the Taiwan Relations Reinforcement Act to require Senate confirmation of the AIT/W chair and explicitly delineate the lines of authority between Washington and Taipei.
The AIT/T director plays a vital role in day-to-day engagement with officials across Taiwan. However, the AIT/W chair oversees the daily execution of U.S. policy toward Taiwan from Washington, including the management of arms sales, interagency policy coordination, and congressional engagement. In recent years, the AIT/W chair’s visibility has surged, driven by heightened Chinese military activity around Taiwan, then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s August 2022 visit, “a conga line” of U.S. congressional delegations, a growing backlog of arms deliveries, and new U.S. financing commitments. These factors have made the AIT/W chair indispensable to managing Taiwan policy from Washington.
The chair now functions as a de facto assistant secretary for Taiwan policy, bridging congressional appropriations, executive allocations, Pentagon implementation, and U.S. government exchanges. To succeed, future chairs must be fluent in Taiwan policy, experienced in security cooperation, and proficient in Mandarin. Requiring Senate confirmation for both roles would ensure qualified and accountable leadership, increased transparency, and necessary congressional oversight for two of the United States’ most sensitive foreign policy portfolios..
While the Taiwan Relations Reinforcement Act calls for Senate confirmation of the AIT/T director in Taipei, it omits any mention of the AIT/W chair. This silence echoes the original Taiwan Relations Act of 1979, which has never clarified how AIT senior leadership is appointed or the authorities they hold. As both roles expand and grow in complexity, this legal vacuum creates bureaucratic friction between U.S. agencies, contributing to delays, duplication, and unclear lines of responsibility. Amending the Taiwan Relations Reinforcement Act to define these positions would reduce confusion and better align U.S. institutions with Taiwan’s growing strategic importance.
With a division of labor clarified through an amendment to the Taiwan Relations Reinforcement Act, a Senate-confirmed AIT/W chair could focus on strategic coordination, defense delivery, policy leadership, and congressional engagement. An AIT/W chair with a congressionally mandated focus on Washington, D.C., is better positioned to streamline approvals, remove bureaucratic bottlenecks, and respond quickly to congressional intent without requiring as much in-Washington engagement from the AIT/T director. Similarly, a Senate-confirmed AIT/T director could focus more on broad diplomatic engagement with Taiwan’s governmental ministries, civil society, and political institutions.
This kind of dual structure in diplomatic and interagency coordination is not new. For example, U.S. diplomacy often divides labor between Washington-based strategy leads, such as special envoys, and in-country implementers, like ambassadors. Likewise, regional deputy assistant secretaries coordinate policy from Washington, while chiefs of mission carry it out in the field.
Since 2017, U.S. defense planners have identified Taiwan as the top military contingency in the Indo-Pacific. As China intensifies its coercion campaign against Taiwan, Washington needs officials who understand Taiwan’s security environment, delivery pipelines, and interagency coordination challenges. As a result, the AIT/W chair should reflect those priorities, which remain largely bipartisan regardless of which administration is in power. Congress can ensure those qualifications by requiring Senate confirmation for both the AIT/W chair and the AIT/T director. This promotes greater transparency and compels Congress to take more ownership through robust oversight of AIT’s activities.
Requiring Senate confirmation for the AIT/W chair and AIT/T director signals that the United States treats Taiwan policy as a shared responsibility between the executive and legislative branches. It demonstrates to Taipei that U.S. support is durable, bipartisan, and reflects long-term strategic thinking rather than short-term political will. It reinforces internal clarity within the U.S. government by ensuring that accountable officials carry out Taiwan policy with structure, discipline, and institutional oversight.
That kind of clarity matters. It can help speed up arms deliveries, eliminate interagency delays, and strengthen deterrence through consistent leadership and accountable decision-makers. As Taiwan policy continues to unite both parties in Congress, especially around issues of transparency and defense, Senate confirmation of these roles offers a rare but significant bipartisan win. Ambiguity in strategy has its place. In bureaucratic execution, it undermines credibility, especially on an issue as sensitive as Taiwan.
Taiwan sits at the center of U.S. strategic interests in the Indo-Pacific. To meet that challenge, the United States must ensure that accountable and empowered leaders are in place to manage its Taiwan policy. The president and Senate can most effectively ensure leadership-level appointments by using the straightforward process of appointment and confirmation. Congress should therefore amend the Taiwan Relations Reinforcement Act, as proposed by Senators Merkley and Curtis, to require Senate confirmation for both the AIT/T director and the AIT/W chair. The amendment should also define the division of labor between the two roles.
By sharing responsibility for these positions, the executive and legislative branches can strengthen bipartisan support for Taiwan and provide the president with the clarity and structure needed to respond decisively in the event of a Taiwan contingency. What began as an improvised workaround has lasted nearly half a century. But with Taiwan policy now central to U.S. national security, that improvisation must finally give way to institutional clarity and democratic accountability.