Trump aims to stabilize trade in Beijing summit with Xi

Summary

Summary

The summit in Beijing is the latest attempt by President Donald Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping to keep their economic relationship from slipping back into confrontation, even as both governments prepare for a wider competition over technology, critical minerals and energy. Trump is departing Tuesday for the meeting, which the White House described as part of a sequence of potentially up to four meetings this year.

Trump has framed the case for stability through trade profits, saying “We’re doing a lot of business with China and making a lot of money,” adding “We’re making a lot of money — it’s different than it used to be.” Administration officials, however, have also acknowledged that the meeting is about buying time and space for continued engagement rather than closing a full set of disputes in a single round.

The encounter, according to U.S. officials, is primarily aimed at extending a trade truce reached last October. The truce could be maintained while China outlines steps that could include plans to buy American soybeans, beef and Boeing airplanes, and while the sides discuss a mechanism to keep talks going on economic issues. Some in the Trump administration also have said that stability is the priority beyond any specific deliverables, with The Asia Group consultant Brett Fetterly describing the “outcome that matters more than any set of deliverables” as stability and “space for continued engagement.”

Fetterly said engagement is only a first step toward addressing the broader set of pressures that can disrupt relations, including tariffs, competition in artificial intelligence and electric vehicle production, and the ways the Iran war is reshaping strategic calculations for both countries. The meeting comes as officials view multiple fronts—industrial policy, supply chains and sanctions—as overlapping with economic negotiations.

Still, U.S. and Chinese officials appear to be approaching the relationship from different angles. Trump’s team has leaned toward the idea that the U.S. can keep an edge on AI and therefore should focus on trade imbalance, while Chinese leaders see external developments such as climate change and the Iran war as changing the strategic environment for industries where China wants to move faster, including solar panels and electric vehicles.

Michael Sobolik, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, said the two governments are “competing at different levels and different domains” and with “different theories of victory.” Sobolik said Trump “leveraged tariffs” as leverage to secure a trade deal, while Xi Jinping is “angling to win a cold war with the United States.” Ali Wyne, of the International Crisis Group, also linked the Iran war to an energy inflection point, saying the U.S. side is banking on continued reliance on oil and natural gas while China sees disruptions to energy shipments—such as after disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz—as supporting a green energy transition aligned with China’s industrial strategy.

Those differences are playing out inside the numbers as well. Despite Trump’s claims about profitability, the story points to U.S. Census Bureau data showing China bought nearly $50 billion less in American products last year than it did in 2022, with some of the decrease attributed in part to China stopping soybean purchases during last year’s trade war. The administration has said it wants to support U.S. farmers and factories by having China import more from the United States to narrow a trade imbalance that totaled $202 billion last year.

The report also points to shifts in how goods flow, including that the United States now imports more goods from Taiwan than China, and that, going back to Trump’s first term, China began routing some U.S.-bound products through other Asian countries while U.S. companies shifted supply chains for computers and other electronics to Vietnam and India. According to government data analyzed by Chad Bown of the Peterson Institute for International Economics, China’s share of goods imported to the U.S. fell from 22% at the start of Trump’s first term in 2017 to 7.5% in the first three months of this year.

In addition to a hoped-for extension of the truce, the summit is expected to spotlight a proposed governing structure for future talks. U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said he “highlighted” in an April 30 call with Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng the value of a “new government-to-government Board of Trade.” Greer indicated the board could focus on improving trade in goods while addressing national security concerns, which could include agricultural products but not computer chips or other sensitive technology.

The board is also described as a potential way to resolve disputes and make it harder for the relationship to spiral into another round of tariff escalation. The report notes that tariff hikes have become a logistical and legal problem after the Supreme Court ruled Trump lacked authority to unilaterally impose many tariffs last year, and after a federal court deemed Trump’s temporary replacement tariffs illegal in a recent decision. U.S. officials said the U.S. and China would need sign-off at home to create the board, and they also want to discuss a separate investment forum to address financing of operations in each country.

Business leaders are expected to travel with the U.S. delegation, including about 17 CEOs, as the White House said, featuring Tesla CEO Elon Musk, Apple CEO Tim Cook and Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg. The mix of officials and executives underscores the administration’s emphasis on keeping trade channels open while officials plan for future competition in sectors tied to industrial strategy.

Even with the tone of stable engagement, the report describes several potential strains that could quickly complicate the summit. Those include China’s control of most rare earth mining and almost all processing for minerals used in electronics, the U.S. push to limit China’s access to advanced computer chips designed by companies such as Nvidia and AMD, and China’s dominance in vehicle exports. The report also flags tariffs, including the administration’s move to use national security investigations under the Trade Act of 1974 after the Supreme Court struck down Trump’s tariffs, along with sanctions disputes related to a Chinese oil refinery and Iranian oil shipments.

Across those issues, the core question is whether the summit can keep economic ties from breaking down as other disputes intensify, a theme Fetterly and other officials link to the broader challenge of sustaining engagement. In the meantime, Trump and Xi are meeting under public language that emphasizes stability—while both sides’ strategic calculations remain vulnerable to events, particularly those tied to technology competition and the Iran war.

If you read this as part of the broader coverage chain, MSI previously reported on what to watch for in the Beijing meeting in What to know about Trump-Xi summit in Beijing.