President Donald Trump invited China’s leader Xi Jinping and his wife, Peng Liyuan, for a White House visit on Sept. 24.
“We look forward to it,” Trump said during remarks at a banquet in Beijing.
The president called the high-stakes summit Thursday a “fantastic day” and “historic,” adding that the meetings were “extremely positive and productive.”
Xi and Trump appeared friendly and positive during their banquet remarks, praising one another’s leadership and vision. Away from the cameras, talks were more tense with Taiwan emerging as a flashpoint.
Chinese officials said that Xi “stressed to President Trump that the Taiwan question is the most important issue in China-U.S. relations” while a White House official conspicuously didn’t mention Taiwan in a statement to the media.
The September meeting would be the third meeting between the two leaders in Trump’s second term. They met in South Korea in October. Xi last visited the U.S. in November 2023, meeting with former President Joe Biden on the sidelines of the APEC summit in San Francisco.