Democrats won majorities in both the Senate and the House in the US midterm elections, handing President Donald Trump's Republican Party a defeat. On November 5, Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi told reporters she still wants to work with Trump, and the remark drew criticism online.
Takaichi said the result was a matter of another country's domestic politics and that the Japanese government had no particular comment. She went on to say she wants to keep strengthening Japan-US relations and to work with Trump, according to a political desk reporter at a national newspaper.
Online, critics asked whether she intended to stay on a sinking ship. Others called the stance too plainly deferential to Washington and said her work on the weak yen, a large expansion of military spending and remarks about a Taiwan contingency had all been done on Trump's terms, with no sign of reflection.
Diplomatic record under scrutiny
Questions about Takaichi's diplomatic skill predate the midterms. She skipped a G7 online meeting and, when pressed over it, blamed the French hosts, angering Paris. Japanese cars also looked likely to be excluded from EV incentives.
On November 5 she spoke by phone with French President Emmanuel Macron and conveyed strong concern about a European-made electric vehicle preference scheme the EU is considering. Online critics called that brazen after skipping the G7 and said she knows too little about how to conduct herself internationally.
Takaichi is also expected to miss the leaders' meeting at COP31, the 31st Conference of the Parties to the UN climate convention, in Turkey in mid-November. She missed last year's conference as well.
Ozawa calls for resignation
“The biggest problem with what passes for Takaichi diplomacy is that it is one-track. She does not think ahead and does nothing but subordinate herself to President Trump.”Ichiro Ozawa, former member of the House of Representatives
Ozawa, a former lower house member, also wrote that she has not moved to repair the Japan-China relationship she damaged or to resolve the abduction issue, and has left both to Trump. He called it a rare case of diplomacy that harms the national interest and asked whether she should step down before endangering the country further.
Citing news of the COP31 absence, Ozawa asked whether Takaichi has developed a fear of diplomacy. He said she lacks the English and conversational ability to match her record as a US Congressional Research Service investigator and may fear being confronted over the gap. He wrote that if she will not fulfill the duties of prime minister, she should resign immediately.