Former U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris praised South Korean companies' investment in the United States while saying such investment should not be the product of American pressure. She criticized President Donald Trump's punitive tariff policy and called for mutually beneficial economic cooperation among allies. She also said she was "very disappointed" by Trump's decision to scale back joint South Korea-U.S. military exercises, stressing the need to strengthen the alliance.
According to diplomatic sources on Oct. 15, Harris spoke favorably of South Korean investment in U.S. shipbuilding, semiconductors, electric vehicles and solar energy during a lecture and discussion on "American Leadership and the Future of Alliances" held the previous day at the Asan Institute for Policy Studies in Seoul's Jongno District. Asked how South Korea should expand economic cooperation with the United States, she said South Korea should keep doing what it is doing, adding that she genuinely believed so.
She placed particular emphasis on cooperation with South Korea's shipbuilding industry. Harris said she had held an extensive conversation with South Korean shipbuilding executives the previous night, and that the United States needed to invest more in shipbuilding, describing South Korea's work in the sector as globally significant. The remarks were read as highlighting the role South Korean shipbuilding plays in strengthening U.S. industrial competitiveness.
She also praised the role of South Korean companies in semiconductors and electric vehicles. Recalling a visit to a Hanwha Qcells plant in the U.S. state of Georgia, Harris said South Korea's technology investment in the United States and its contribution to the American workforce were highly important and highly valued. She again urged South Korean companies to keep doing what they are doing.
Investment "Should Not Be the Result of a Threat": Harris Takes Aim at Punitive Tariffs
Harris drew a clear line, however, saying investment in the United States should not be the result of American pressure. When Lee Jung-min, a visiting senior fellow at the Asan Institute who moderated the discussion, noted that South Korean companies would have to invest billions of dollars more in the United States, Harris responded that they should not be doing so as the result of a threat. Trust in an alliance, she added, must be mutual. The comments amounted to criticism of the Trump administration's use of tariffs and other levers to press allies into investing in the United States.
Harris continued her criticism of the Trump administration's foreign and trade policy in her keynote address. She said U.S. foreign policy was increasingly based on naked transactionalism, and that punitive tariffs and favors driven by greed had caused serious damage to both the U.S. domestic economy and the global economy. The United States, she said, should use its economic power strategically rather than recklessly or maliciously, and tariffs should be deployed as a selective policy tool.
She warned in particular against relations between countries becoming fixated on short-term gains. It would be naive to say there is no transactional element in relations between states, she said, but the question is whether a country thinks only about short-term gains or also recognizes the importance of investing for long-term results. She also stressed the need to provide a predictable trade environment so that U.S. and foreign companies can operate with stability.
On economic security, she identified supply chains and access to critical minerals as key tasks. Harris said the United States must invest in a robust domestic industrial strategy and work with allies to strengthen supply chain resilience and prevent bottlenecks and shortages. The point, she suggested, was that strengthening U.S. industrial competitiveness requires not only domestic investment but also economic cooperation with allies.
"Very Disappointed" by Scaled-Back Drills, Urges Stronger Extended Deterrence
Harris was also critical of the Trump administration's approach to the alliance. She said she was "very disappointed" by Trump's decision in August to scale back joint South Korea-U.S. military exercises, adding that disappointed was not a strong enough word. Such a move, she said, runs counter to strengthening the alliance for the safety and stability of South Korea and the Indo-Pacific, and also runs counter to raising the standing of the United States in the world.
She also took issue with Trump's approach to North Korea. Citing moves to embrace Pyongyang alongside the punitive tariff policy, she said all of these steps run counter to strengthening alliances. The United States, she added, needs to recommit to its promises to South Korea as an ally.
She also argued for stronger extended deterrence against North Korea's nuclear threat. Strengthening extended deterrence with respect to North Korea is extremely important, Harris said, and allies should work together to determine the best approach to what extended deterrence should concretely look like. She did not state a direct position on the possibility of an independent South Korean nuclear arsenal or the redeployment of U.S. tactical nuclear weapons.
She added that ties among North Korea, China, Iran and Russia were deepening, and that she remained concerned that these relationships were developing openly. Allies, she said, must respond jointly to the risks that closer cooperation among those countries poses to security and stability in the Indo-Pacific.
She also acknowledged that trust in the United States abroad had weakened. Harris said she was well aware that the United States had lost a degree of influence and was seen as a less reliable partner than before. Even if a future president who values alliances enters the White House, she said, that alone would not be enough to restore trust in relationships built over decades, and sustained effort would be needed to repair them.
On artificial intelligence, she called for slowing the pace of development and establishing international safety norms. Harris said the world had not faced an existential risk as large and complex as AI since the advent of nuclear weapons, pointing to cyberattacks, biological weapons and uncontrollable AI as major dangers. The pace of AI development should be slowed so that firm safeguards can be put in place first, she said, and the United States should work with allies while also bringing China to the negotiating table.
Asked about a possible run in the 2028 U.S. presidential election, Harris left the door open, saying she was still thinking about it and had not decided. But she said 2028 would not matter if Democrats failed to win in the 2026 elections, indicating she was focused for now on the midterms. She said she believed Democrats would clearly win the House and had a strong chance of winning the Senate as well, claiming that the number of House districts where Democrats could flip Republican seats had risen to 46 from 40.
Harris served as vice president under the Joe Biden administration from 2021 to 2025, the first woman, first Black American and first South Asian American to hold the office. She ran as the Democratic presidential nominee in the 2024 election but lost to Trump. She is currently mentioned as a potential Democratic contender for the 2028 presidential race.