PMplays down US trade leg-up
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has downplayed any suggestion that Chris Liddell’s appointment to a top White House job could advantage New Zealand.
US President Donald Trump has appointed the Matamata-born businessman as his deputy chief of staff with responsibility for policy co-ordination.
‘‘You can always hope that having a New Zealander in such an important role will mean our relationship is strengthened,’’ Ardern said.
‘‘But I hold no expectation. He has a much wider job to do than to just sit and advocate for New Zealand in the United States.’’
National Party leader Simon Bridges said it was an ‘‘exciting thing’’ for New Zealanders to have someone ‘‘so high up in the administration no matter whether it is a Republican or Democrat’’.
‘‘I think New Zealanders will on the whole be proud of it. I think personal relations matter. To have someone who maybe will help us get through the door is valuable.’’
Bridges appeared to harbour hope Liddell might help New Zealand get an exemption from proposed US tariffs on steel and aluminium. ‘‘You would hope the New Zealand Government is using every angle including a Kiwi who is very high up in that administration,’’ he said.
Peter Field – a New York-born historian who studied with President Barack Obama at Columbia University and who is now a professor at Canterbury University – said it was hard to know what Liddell’s role would involve given this White House was so different from others.
‘‘There are a couple of things which we know for sure, which is that Liddell has two character- istics that make this appointment just what we would expect.’’
Field said he believed Liddell was close to Trump’s son-in-law and adviser Jared Kushner. ‘‘That makes him in ‘the family’.’’
Liddell’s former role as chief financial officer of Microsoft would also have been an asset in his rise as it was not a ‘‘Washington beltway’’ role, he said.
Auckland University professor of international relations Stephen Hoadley said he hoped Liddell could fulfil some of the role previously undertaken by former economic adviser Gary Cohn, who resigned in the wake of the proposed tariffs on steel and aluminium.
‘‘That is to gently remind Trump that it is not good for US economic interests to do what Trump is trying to do and that moderation is a much better policy.’’ But he said that was probably wishful thinking.
Hoadley didn’t believe New Zealand would pay a price for any associations Kiwis had with the Trump Administration, if normal service resumed in US politics at a future date.
‘‘I am sure an incoming Democrat administration would forgive New Zealand the necessary contacts it had with the Trump Administration,’’ he said.
‘‘Ardern has made her views clear not only to the US but also to Australia on undocumented migrants, for example.
‘‘I think that is probably the right approach. You don’t directly criticise the United States, you simply state your own values and your interests which may differ from those of the US.’’
Otago University politics professor Robert Patman believed New Zealand should adopt a twotrack approach. ‘‘It would embarrass this country if we tried to bury the differences between our world view and theirs and in the process compromised our own.’’
He said New Zealand should be ‘‘friendly’’ but make it clear it did not agree with the Trump Administration’s approach to climate change, talk of trade wars or its stand-offish approach to institutions such the United Nations.