U.S.-China relations May 2025-

Xi and Trump Hold Call, China Says
Chinese state media said the leaders spoke by phone on Thursday, amid worsening tensions between Washington and Beijing.
(NYT) President Trump spoke to China’s top leader, Xi Jinping, on Thursday for the first time since taking office, according to Chinese state media, as a fragile truce in a trade war between the world’s two largest economies shows signs of unraveling.
The call was reported by Chinese state media in a brief dispatch late Thursday that did not immediately include details. Mr. Trump and Mr. Xi were last known to have spoken to each other on Jan. 17, days before Mr. Trump was inaugurated as president.
The call comes as tensions between China and the United States have ratcheted up again nearly a month after the two sides met in Geneva and agreed to a pause in the trade war.
On Wednesday, Mr. Trump wrote on social media that Mr. Xi was “VERY TOUGH, AND EXTREMELY HARD TO MAKE A DEAL WITH.”
While America’s Front Doors are Closing to China, Back Doors are Opening
The hypocrisy of Trump’s techno-nationalism
Robert Reich
When it comes to non-Americans, Trump and his regime are clear: Foreigners — especially if they’re Chinese — are no longer wanted here. Nor are their products. Nor are we prepared to sell them our advanced technologies.
But foreign bribes? Hell, they’re welcome at the highest levels, even if they result in some critical technologies reaching China.
First, consider all the front doors now closing to China.
The State Department is revoking the visas of Chinese students who are “studying in critical fields.” This could be a big deal. Some 277,000 students from China attended school in the United States last year, second only to the number of students from India.
In addition to raising tariffs on Chinese products entering the United States, Trump is considering prohibiting major Chinese chipmakers — as well as units of Chinese technology giants like Alibaba, Tencent, and Baidu — from trading with the United States.
Meanwhile, the United States has ordered a broad swath of American companies to stop shipping high-tech goods to China without a license and revoked licenses already granted to certain suppliers.
… A technology trail now leads from the United States to oil-producing nations and then to China.
Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and United Arab Emirates have been granting Trump personal favors. Their presumed goal is to get access to American technology. … What do Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the UAE get from all these deals? All are seeking to diversify their economies away from oil by boosting their technology sectors.
Trump is granting them greater access to advanced technologies from the United States, including advanced semiconductors from companies like Nvidia and AMD.
Yet at the same time, these nations are strengthening their strategic partnerships with China in artificial intelligence, advanced computing, and quantum information technology.
They’ve entered into joint ventures with Chinese counterparts for producing unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and AI-related projects, including the development of smart cities and AI-powered infrastructure.
Here’s another back door to China: Chinese crypto billionaire Justin Sun, who’s based in Hong Kong.
Sun is the largest holder of Trump’s $TRUMP memecoin. His $23-million investment has put him into the exclusive circle of investors who were invited to a private VIP dinner with Trump on May 22.

12-18 May
By eroding US soft power, Trump is ceding the contest to China
(SCMP) Trump 2.0 has boosted China’s charm offensive, making its assertive foreign policy and unapologetic authoritarianism look less threatening …since US President Donald Trump’s return to office, the balance of international attraction has been shifting remarkably in Beijing’s favour.
China Called Trump’s Bluff
There is a lesson here for everybody Trump threatens, whether countries or businesses or universities..
By Jonathan Chait
(The Atlantic) When President Donald Trump launched his trade war on the world, he issued a stern warning: “Do not retaliate and you will be rewarded.” China ignored the warning. It was rewarded anyway. This morning, Trump largely suspended his trade war in return for nothing but promises of ongoing discussions.
The unveiling of the Trump global tariff regime was accompanied by a distinct form of dominance theater. The president and his gang assured his targets that if they submitted to his tariffs, he would repay their compliance. Any country that dared defy him would suffer terribly.
Most of the world…discover[ed] the difficulty of making global trade deals with a president who doesn’t seem to understand how trade works. Foreign diplomats expressed repeated frustration as they failed to ascertain what Trump even wanted from them, let alone what he was prepared to offer in return. To date, only the United Kingdom has managed to resolve its trade status with the United States.
Trump might claim China tariff victory – but this is Capitulation Day
Heather Stewart, Economics editor
The president’s retreat suggests he might negotiate elsewhere, but leaves corrosive uncertainty in its wake
(The Guardian) … If Trump is indeed ready to give in even with Beijing, it sends a signal that some of the other aggressive aspects of his trade policy may be negotiable.
What Bessent and his Chinese counterparts have not erased, however, is the corrosive uncertainty that has gripped investors across the global economy since Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariff announcement.
China tariffs have only been slashed temporarily, for now and many other countries are still awaiting negotiations on where their tariff levels will end up, after that other 90-day pause, on Trump’s “reciprocal” levies, due to end in July.
Meanwhile, companies throughout the global trading system are left wondering which particular iteration of the policy is likely to stick, and may well be tempted to continue working around the US, where possible.
And with 30% tariffs remaining on Chinese exports to the US, the bigger picture remains of two great economic powers pulling apart.
America has given China a strangely good tariff deal
For the next 90 days, at least

Tariff Truce With China Demonstrates the Limits of Trump’s Aggression
President Trump’s triple-digit tariffs on Chinese products disrupted global trade — but haven’t appeared to result in major concessions from Beijing.
(NYT) Trade talks between the world’s largest economies in Geneva this weekend concluded with an agreement to reduce stiff levies on each other’s products by more than many analysts had anticipated. Chinese imports will face a minimum tax of 30 percent, down from 145 percent. China will lower its import duty on American goods to 10 percent from 125 percent. The two countries also agreed to hold talks to stabilize the relationship.
The tariffs ultimately proved too painful to American businesses for Mr. Trump to sustain. Within weeks, Trump officials were saying that the tariffs the president had chosen to impose on one of America’s largest trading partners were unsustainable, and that they were angling to reduce them.

9 May
You called me. No — you called ME. Before US-China meeting, nations each say the other wanted talks
(AP) “The obsession with who reached out first is a proxy fight over leverage,” said Craig Singleton, senior director of the China program at the Washington-based think tank Foundation for Defense of Democracies. “For Washington, signaling that Beijing initiated the meeting reinforces the narrative that the tariffs are working. For Beijing, denying outreach preserves the illusion of parity and avoids domestic perception of weakness.”

7 May
US, China to hold ice-breaker trade talks in Geneva on Saturday
Bessent, Greer will hold trade talks with China’s He Lifeng
Stock markets lifted by prospect of tensions easing
U.S.-China tariffs “the equivalent of an embargo”, Bessent says
China injects new monetary stimulus to combat tariff blow
(Reuters) U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and chief trade negotiator Jamieson Greer will meet China’s economic tsar He Lifeng in Switzerland this weekend for talks that could be the first step toward resolving a trade war disrupting the global economy.
Who is He Lifeng, the Chinese trade tsar taking centre stage in US tariff talks?
Vice Premier He to meet U.S. officials on Saturday
He initially underwhelmed foreign investors, but has gained confidence and experience
He described as ideological proponent of state-led growth
(Reuters) – He Lifeng, a longtime confidant of Chinese President Xi Jinping who has slowly cultivated a reputation among foreign investors as a key fixer, will take centre stage in talks on Saturday aimed at breaking a trade deadlock with the United States.
Trump’s team is finally meeting with China. The future of the global economy is riding on its success
CNN — US President Donald Trump’s top trade officials will meet with their Chinese counterparts this week to discuss a de-escalation of their increasingly ugly and damaging trade war. The future of the global economy is riding on their success.
The trade talks, the first in-person meeting between Chinese and American officials since the tit-for-tat tariff escalation kicked off in earnest in March, are unlikely to result in a trade deal, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Tuesday. But tariffs have reached such a high level that trade between the two countries has dropped off dramatically. Any thaw in the trade war could be a welcome sign for businesses and consumers in both countries and around the globe.
“The main objective of this meeting is to establish the conditions for a deal to be reached, including by defining what is feasible to be agreed upon and what isn’t,” said Alfredo Montufar-Helu, head of the Conference Board’s China Center. “There might be some quick wins, like a temporal pause of tariffs, which would bring much needed relief to businesses from both countries.”