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India-friend Huntsman in race for Trump’s secretary of state
President-elect Donald Trump has expanded his search for secretary of state, and it now includes Jon Huntsman, a former governor who shares a good equation with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and is a strong supporter of ties with India.
President-elect Donald Trump has expanded his search for secretary of state, and it now includes Jon Huntsman, a former governor who shares a good equation with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and is a strong supporter of ties with India.
The India link is personal. His youngest daughter, Asha, is from Gujarat. He adopted her when he was governor of Utah and Modi was chief minister of the state. Modi’s first question to Huntsman was about Asha when they met in 2015.
A late entrant to the race, Huntsman is up against frontrunners Mitt Romney, the 2012 Republican nominee for president, Rudy Giuliani, former New York City mayor, senator Bob Corker and former CIA director Davis Petraeus.
Trump’s search for secretary of state, the nation’s top diplomat, has become embroiled in a bitter feud between his senior advisers over Romney, who has met the president-elect twice and was reported to be his favourite.
But the Trump campaign said on Sunday the list was being expanded beyond the four, and, according to reports, Huntsman, who ran for president in 2012 and had called for Trump to drop out of race earlier this year, was among the fresh entrants.
Huntsman has more foreign policy experience than some of the frontrunners, having served as US ambassador first to Singapore and then China and as the US Trade Representative, who keeps an eye on America’s trade interests around the world.
Currently head of Atlantic Council, an influential Washington DC think-tank focussed on international affairs, he has travelled widely meeting and engaged with world leaders, with India and West Asia heading his list of destinations.
Huntsman has been extremely keen on India, and has argued for stronger ties between India and the US to balance the rise of China, and not solely through defence cooperation but realising the full potential of ties, most importantly economic.
“To fulfill the potential in the US-India relationship, the alliance must cultivate roots in both high and low politics,” Huntsman wrote in a piece co-authored with Bharath Gopalaswamy, South Asia head at Atlantic Council, in June, on the eve of Modi’s visit.
“‘High politics’ largely pertains to issues of national security, while “low politics” focuses on economic issues, people-to-people exchanges, and cultural ties. Thus far, both US and Indian policy elites have segmented this relationship, prioritizing India’s value as a defense partner over its economic and trading potential. But if their shared security perception erodes, the US-India partnership is unlikely to endure without other connections.”
Huntsman also launched the US-India Trade Initiative at the think tank to “to create a platform for engagement, to build consensus, and to advocate increasing US-India trade to $500 billion by addressing the most crucial areas of the US-India trade relationship”.
Due to his interest in India, there was talk at one stage, and one he did nothing to stop, that he was trying for ambassadorship to India. That didn’t happen, but according to those who know him, his interest in India continues.
“He will be good for India no matter what position he gets in the cabinet,” said Gopalaswamy, the Indian-origin co-author of Huntsman’s article on India.
Huntsman also shares a special relationship with foreign secretary S Jaishankar, harking back to their days as ambassadors to China for their respective countries. They met when Jaishankar was in the US recently.