In the weeks leading up to President Trump welcoming President Xi Jinping of China to Washington on Wednesday evening, Beijing has been accused of undermining America’s national interests on a number of fronts.
Mr. Trump accused the country this summer of “sinister election meddling” in the 2020 election, a breach he considered so historic he presented the claims in a prime-time address. Since the start of the war with Iran, Chinese companies have provided Tehran with satellite imagery, and access to a spy satellite, that Iran’s military forces have used to mount attacks in the region, according to multiple U.S. officials. And Beijing has shown no signs of retreating from its business dealings with Iran, in defiance of U.S. efforts to cut off economic lifelines to Tehran.
But as his meeting with Mr. Xi approached, Mr. Trump has repeatedly found ways to give him a pass — portraying him more as a personal friend than as a geopolitical competitor despite significant rivalries on matters of global power, trade, artificial intelligence and more
Mr. Trump has spent weeks boosting the visit as a major event for the United States, sprucing up the White House beforehand,, and planning for a state visit that will start with a rare greeting at Joint Base Andrews.
Even staunch allies of Mr. Trump have bristled at the plans.
On Tuesday, Senator Roger Wicker, Republican of Mississippi and chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said in a speech on the Senate floor that he would have advised against the invitation to the “brutal, unelected and oppressive dictator who seeks to dominate his neighbors and whose massive military arsenal is aimed directly at the United States of America.”
Mr. Wicker said he hoped Mr. Trump would press Mr. Xi on “the purposes of China’s massive military buildup, or about China’s clear support for Iran.”
Responding to Mr. Wicker’s comments, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the visit reflected an acknowledgment by Mr. Trump that despite disagreements, China is one of the largest economic and military powers in the world.
“The relationship between the United States and China will define the 21st century, what happens in that relationship,” Mr. Rubio said. “The idea that we would not interact with them at the highest levels is irresponsible. It’s outrageous. We have to.”
Foreign policy experts say that Mr. Trump’s posture has been striking even for a president who prides himself on his personal brand of diplomacy.
“Trump is displaying an extraordinary degree of deference to Xi,” said Julian Gewirtz, a scholar at Columbia University who has written on the history of U.S.-China relations. “He is lavishing honors on China’s leader while downplaying threats to American interests. Beijing could scarcely have asked for a more accommodating host.”
Mr. Gewirtz, who also served a former White House and State Department official working on China under President Joseph R. Biden Jr., said that traditionally it has been Beijing that has sought out a state visit. This time, he said, the dynamic seems reversed. What Mr. Trump emerges with from all of the spectacle will be a test of his brand of diplomacy, which emphasizes personal ties.
“Washington has often leveraged symbolic honors to seek substantive gains from Beijing,” he said. “So the question is straightforward: What is Trump getting for America in return for all this ceremony?”
In a call with reporters, White House officials said the agenda with Mr. Xi will include topics like artificial intelligence, fentanyl and the upcoming expiration of a trade truce.
Asked whether the president planned to raise Mr. Trump’s allegations that China interfered in the 2020 election, the White House had no comment.
Another White House official pushed back against the premise that Mr. Trump was overly deferential to Mr. Xi. The official pointed to a number of measures the United States has taken that have affected China’s economy, including a marked decline on exports to the United States.
The person said United States has targeted some entities that have been found to support Iran — though no major banks — and that other measures are in the works behind the scenes that have not yet been announced.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the visit ahead of time.
(Last month, when Mr. Trump was asked why he was not targeting Chinese banks the way he was generally targeting allies like Canada, he snapped back: “Well, who said I’m not? You said, why not. I mean, who said I’m not. You don’t know if I’m doing it. Well, I don’t have to announce everything, do I?”)
A Treasury Department spokesman said in a follow-up email that Secretary Scott Bessent, who is spearheading the so-called “Operation Economic Outcast” operation, has made it clear to China that it will not hesitate to hold them accountable for supporting Iran economically.
In recent weeks, when pressed about China’s behavior, Mr. Trump at several points seemed to make excuses for Mr. Xi.
During an Oval Office event this month in which he called the war in Iran “small potatoes,” Mr. Trump suggested that China’s aid to Iran was negligible because of his personal plea.
“I said, please don’t get involved to President Xi — I have a very good relationship,” Mr. Trump said. “And they’re not really involved. Very little involvement by China. China could have plenty of involvement. They get 50 percent of the oil from the Hormuz strait.”
Later in the month, when asked about reports that Chinese entities may have provided the Iranians with satellite imagery that led to deadly strikes on U.S. forces in Jordan, again Mr. Trump demurred.
“They basically do what we do,” he said.
“Are you going to raise that with Xi when he visits?” a reporter asked.
“I think he’s behaved reasonably well, and we behave reasonably well,” Mr. Trump said. “You know when they say that China spies on us, I say you’re right, and we spy on them too. You know, we spy on them too.”
Pressed during a Fox News interview about what Mr. Xi may want from his visit , Mr. Trump pivoted to his consistent refrain: “You know, he and I get along very well.”
That the visit comes after Mr. Trump has spent weeks escalating attacks on America’s allies presents a particularly jarring split-screen, several foreign policy analysts say.
“There’s a rule of international politics that American presidents normally follow: treat your allies better than your adversaries,” said R. Nicholas Burns, the top U.S. diplomat in Beijing under the Biden administration. “And we don’t want to give the impression to our allies that we actually care more about this relationship with Xi Jinping than we care about the relationship with them. I think the president is giving that impression by being so unremittingly uncritical of the Chinese.”
Mr. Burns added that Mr. Trump’s tactics are unlikely to work on China, which he said responds to strength.
“They are practical, hardheaded, cynical about the United States,” Mr. Burns said. “They’re going to judge us, I think, by how strong we are and how much we push back when we have to push back. I think the Chinese understand power and deterrence. They’ll be swayed more and affected more by a strong American position than they will by flattery.”
If previous summits are any indication, Mr. Trump’s pageantry and flattery to impress Mr. Xi won’t go far, analysts say. When the two met in Korea last year to de-escalate a fierce trade war, for example, Mr. Trump did most the talking and Mr. Xi stayed largely silent. Mr. Trump called Mr. Xi “a friend of mine” and called him “powerful.” The Chinese president approached the meeting with caution and steeliness. In his remarks, Mr. Xi likened China-U. S. relations to a “giant ship” that requires steady joint leadership.
The two leaders come to the U.S. summit in vastly different positions, said Jonathan A. Czin, a researcher at the Brookings Institution who previously worked at the C.I.A. analyzing Chinese politics.
Mr. Xi arrives with time on his side, hoping to buy more for relief from U.S. pressure, as he plans for a fourth term that will keep him in power for another five years. Mr. Trump is facing a midterm election in a few weeks where his policies where his party faces an uphill battle as a result of some of his policies.
“Xi is going to walk into this meeting and is going to be keenly aware of the fact that just weeks from now, Trump is in all likelihood going to be at best a lame-duck president, and at worst, he’s going to be politically maimed at home and have to deal with divided government,” Mr. Czin said.
He continued: “Xi is already thinking about ‘How am I going to keep this gentlemen’s agreement going with the United States,’ buying that time, and already thinking about what comes after Trump.”
Mr. Trump has long had an affinity for autocrats. He regularly boasts about his relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin. This summer he trumpeted what he said was his good relationship with North Korea’s dictator, Kim Jong-un, while canceling long-running military exercises with South Korea, a U.S. ally.
Ruth Ben-Ghiat, a historian at New York University who studies fascism and authoritarianism, said that Mr. Trump has always admired Mr. Xi as having the kind of power he covets.
She pointed out that Mr. Trump’s doomsday declaration last month that “communism is the greatest threat to our country in its history,” had no bearing on Mr. Trump’s “fawning” over the leader of one of the powerful communist countries.
She also pointed to Mr. Trump’s latest defense of China’s government last week when a reporter raised that it was one of the most repressive countries in the world for journalists. Mr. Trump interrupted the reporter’s question, responding: “Well, I don’t know about that. I think we’re repressive also.” (That same day he would ban news organizations whose coverage he doesn’t like from the White House grounds).
“This meeting of head of states has importance for the optics it generates,” Ms. Ben-Ghiat said. “Two powerful strongmen, meeting as equals, at least in Trump’s mind — and for the potential for deals conducted in a nontransparent fashion.”
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