Trump and Xi Open Beijing Summit for First Time in Nearly a Decade
CNBC reported Thursday that U.S. President Donald Trump arrived in Beijing and opened a two-day summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping, marking the first time a sitting American president has visited China since 2017.
The two leaders shook hands outside the Great Hall of the People as official broadcast footage captured the formal welcome ceremony. Both sides exchanged greetings before the delegations settled in for talks expected to run through Friday.
A Packed Agenda Beyond Trade
Tariffs and rare earth materials form the commercial core of the discussions. But the scope extends considerably further. Taiwan, Iran and artificial intelligence all feature on the agenda, signaling that the summit carries strategic weight well beyond bilateral trade arithmetic.
Rare earth access has become an acute pressure point for Washington. China controls a dominant share of global rare earth processing capacity, giving Beijing meaningful leverage over supply chains for defense and technology industries.
Heavy-Hitter Business Delegation Joins Trump
The American contingent arriving in Beijing was notably dense with corporate firepower. Secretary of State Marco Rubio led the diplomatic side, while the business roster included Tesla and SpaceX chief Elon Musk, Apple CEO Tim Cook and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang.
Huang’s inclusion drew particular attention. His presence came shortly after Trump publicly praised the chip executive, and Nvidia’s advanced semiconductors sit at the center of ongoing U.S.-China technology restrictions. Cook’s attendance underscored Apple’s deep manufacturing dependence on China. Musk, meanwhile, operates significant Tesla production facilities in Shanghai.
The Long Gap Since the Last Visit
The previous U.S. presidential visit to Beijing occurred during Trump’s first term in 2017, when he and Xi met amid early friction over trade imbalances. No sitting American president visited China during the subsequent eight years, a span that covered the full Biden administration and the sharpest deterioration in U.S.-China relations in decades.
Traders heading into the summit have been pricing in a tariff truce extension and potential Boeing aircraft purchases as plausible near-term outcomes. Whether the two sides can bridge deeper disagreements on Taiwan arms sales and Iran policy remains the summit’s defining open question.
The meeting is still developing, with the second day of talks set for Friday.
Read Next: US-China Trade Truce Extended as Tariff Rates Drop From 145% to 30%
