By the time U.S. President Donald Trump finished his historic dinner with DPRK leader Kim Jong Un in Hanoi, the airwaves in Washington were, ironically, filled with drama.

Compared with the Trump-Kim summit, the international community seems to be more interested in the bombshells Trump's former attorney Michael Cohen dropped in his congressional testimony.

From hush-money payments to women alleging they had affairs with Trump to "collusions" with Russia in the 2016 presidential election, Cohen implicated his former boss on numerous fronts in his seven-hour testimony.

"Apart from belittling Trump as a 'racist' and a 'conman,' Cohen presented the Congress no strong evidence to back up the explosive accusations," Wang Yong, a professor at the School of International Studies and director of the Center for International Political Economy at Peking University, told CGTN.

"With Cohen kicking off three consecutive days of testimony, which is more about maligning Trump's character than a justice judicial event, GOP and Democrats have launched a new round of verbal attacks and an exchange of slanders in less than two years before the 2020 election," Wang said.

Despite the lack of solid evidence, Cohen's bombshells and the follow-up investigations will inevitably shake Trump's political standing and strike a heavy blow to the president's 2020 election campaign. In this context, a diplomatic victory is of vital importance for GOP to divert domestic attention and strike back at Democrats' offensives.

This explains why the president is in Vietnam coaxing Kim to abandon his nuclear pursuit and, in the past two months, has been actively pushing for a meeting with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping to end the seven-month trade war.

After months of on-again-off-again talks, the Trump administration is determined to clinch a fundamental deal with the world's second-largest economy. Beijing has showcased its utmost sincerity and, in the latest round of negotiations, has largely addressed U.S. concerns about market access, intellectual property, and other structural issues.

The trade agreement, if reached, would be a boon for American farmers and working-class citizens who were the main supporters of Trump's 2016 election campaign. Lesser tensions with Beijing would also mean a boost in exports to China, a strong stimulus to the U.S. economy.

Therefore, as Wang suggested, Trump is desperate for an all-round deal with China, the most convenient tool to divert domestic attention from Cohen's drama and win more votes in the 2020 election. But GOP's diplomatic victory is not what Democrats are happy to see.

It's worth noting that lawmakers sparred with Trump's top trade official Robert Lighthizer Wednesday on whether the possible deal requires congressional approval.

"We have no intention of submitting" the potential accord to the Congress, Lighthizer insisted, arguing that the president had the executive power to implement it. But this was immediately challenged by Democratic lawmakers.

"Democrats may take 'congressional approval' as an opportunity to thwart the passage of the possible deal, pressuring Trump to be tougher on China," Wang said, adding that it is a characteristic of U.S. bipartisan politics to criticize any deal by the rivaling party, even if it conforms to the country's fundamental interests.

Washington's bipartisan fight, according to Wang, is the most overwhelming uncertain factor to any possible Sino-U.S. deal and other GOP's diplomatic activities. 

To break this dilemma, Wang believed that Trump should try to rally support from industrial and commercial enterprises. Democrats, who cannot afford losing votes from business tycoons in next year's election, may refrain from their harsh attacks against Trump's practices on Sino-U.S. trade.

The United States is supposed to shoulder its due obligations as a major power in the world. But with all the drama in the White House, it is ironically becoming fodder for laughter. The superpower needs to understand that it is people's real benefits, instead of dirty political tactics, that will be the trump card to win more seats in Congress.

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