WASHINGTON, Feb 9 – U.S. President Donald Trump on Sunday congratulated Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi on her party’s “landslide victory” in a general election and said it was his honor to endorse her days earlier.
Trump wrote on social media that it was Takaichi’s “bold and wise” decision to call a snap election, adding, “I wish you Great Success in passing your Conservative, Peace Through Strength Agenda.”
Hours after Japan’s Liberal Democratic Party secured a two-thirds majority in the House of Representatives, winning the biggest number of seats in the country’s postwar history, Trump said, “The wonderful people of Japan, who voted with such enthusiasm, will always have my strong support.”
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on a Fox News program that Trump has a “great relationship” with Takaichi and “when Japan is strong, the U.S. is strong in Asia.”
Calling the LDP’s victory an “impressive win,” U.S. Ambassador to Japan George Glass said on social media that the Trump administration looks forward to building on the president’s “reinvigoration of the U.S.-Japan partnership by continuing to deepen cooperation between our two dynamic nations.”
Trump gave his full endorsement to Takaichi, who became Japan’s first female prime minister in October, days ahead of Sunday’s election and said he would welcome her to the White House on March 19.
“Prime Minister Takaichi is someone who deserves powerful recognition for the job she and her Coalition are doing and, therefore, as President of the United States of America, it is my Honor to give a Complete and Total Endorsement of her, and what her highly respected Coalition is representing,” Trump said in a social media post on Thursday.
Takaichi’s trip to Washington, her first since becoming prime minister, will precede Trump’s planned visit in April to China, which for months has been taking a hard-line stance over her remarks about a potential Taiwan Strait crisis.
Trump met with Takaichi in late October in Tokyo, during which they agreed to propel the progress the two allies have made on defense cooperation and the economic front.
In particular, Trump has repeatedly extolled Japan’s commitment to invest heavily in the United States, which is included in Washington’s trade deal with Tokyo reached last summer following his tariff threats.
Since her early days in office, Trump has lauded Takaichi as a protegee of former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, with whom the president had a close personal relationship during his first term.
On Sunday, the State Department also said the administration looks forward to advancing with Japan “U.S. security and economic priorities, as well as our shared interests, in the Indo-Pacific and globally.”
A spokesperson for the department said the U.S.-Japan alliance is “the cornerstone of peace, security and prosperity” in the region and “has never been stronger.”
