Perdue, 74, a business executive and politician, served as a senator for Georgia from 2015 to 2021, and failed in a bid for governor of the state in 2022…reports Asian Lite News
President-elect Donald Trump named political ally and former Georgia senator David Perdue as his pick to be ambassador to China, a key trade partner the Republican has promised to impose punishing tariffs on.
“Tonight, I am announcing that former U.S. Senator, David Perdue, has accepted my appointment as the next United States Ambassador to the People’s Republic of China,” Trump wrote on social media.
Perdue, 74, a business executive and politician, served as a senator for Georgia from 2015 to 2021, and failed in a bid for governor of the state in 2022.
If confirmed by the Senate, Perdue will play a key role in managing the relationship between the United States and China, the world’s two largest economies.
A Trump ally, he backed the former president’s false claims regarding alleged fraud in the 2020 presidential election, which the billionaire Republican lost to Joe Biden. A special grand jury had recommended indicting Perdue over those claims, but the district attorney ultimately declined to charge him in that case.
Trump ignited a trade war with China during his last term, and has promised to again weaponize the use of tariffs to prioritize US manufacturing.
He hailed Perdue as a “loyal supporter” in his social media post, touting his business experience as making him well-suited for the diplomatic role in Beijing. “He will be instrumental in implementing my strategy to maintain Peace in the region, and a productive working relationship with China’s leaders,” said Trump.
“David has been a loyal supporter and friend, and I look forward to working with him in his new role!” Perdue hails from a prominent Georgia business family, most widely known for their chicken industry empire.
While in the Senate, he served on the Armed Services Committee — chairing its Sea Power subcommittee — and on the Foreign Relations Committee. He was one of the richest members of Congress, and one of its most active traders on the stock market while in office, with the New York Times in 2020 reporting the US Department of Justice had investigated him for possible insider trading. Prosecutors did not bring charges in that case.
Sacks appointed AI, crypto czar
Trump on Thursday said he was appointing former PayPal Chief Operating Officer David Sacks as his artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency czar, another step toward overhauling US policy.
“He will work on a legal framework so the Crypto industry has the clarity it has been asking for, and can thrive in the US,” Trump said in a post on his social-media site Truth Social.
The crypto czar and other officials in Trump’s incoming administration such as the chairs of the Securities and Exchange Commission and Commodity Futures Trading Commission are expected to reshape US policy on digital currency along with a newly created crypto advisory council.
Trump’s tech backers generally want to see minimal regulation around AI and cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin, saying Washington would throttle growing innovative sectors with excessive rules.
Trump announced on Wednesday that he was nominating prominent Washington lawyer and crypto advocate Paul Atkins to lead the SEC, in a move celebrated by the industry.
Trump — who once labeled crypto a scam — embraced digital assets during his campaign, promising to make the United States the “crypto capital of the planet” and to accumulate a national stockpile of bitcoin.
Bitcoin broke $100,000 for the first time on Wednesday night, a milestone hailed even by skeptics as a coming-of-age for digital assets as investors bet on a friendly US administration to cement the place of cryptocurrencies in financial markets.
Born in South Africa, Sacks, 52, is a co-founder of venture capital firm Craft Ventures and an early leader of PayPal, a payment processing firm that was acquired by eBay in 2002.
Sacks is also a former chief executive of software company Zenefits and founded Yammer, a social network for enterprise users.
He was an early evangelist of cryptocurrencies, telling CNBC in a 2017 interview that he believed the rise of bitcoin, the world’s largest cryptocurrency, was revolutionizing the Internet.
“It feels like we are witnessing the birth of a new kind of web. Some people have called it the decentralized web or the Internet of money,” he said.
Trump said Sacks will also lead a White House advisory council on science and technology.
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