Will you call President Xi if he doesn’t call you? TIME asked Donald Trump during an interview in April.
“No,” the U.S. President responded.
You won’t?
“Nope.”
Has he called you yet?
“Yep.”
[time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”]When did he call you?
“He’s called. And I don’t think that’s a sign of weakness on his behalf,” Trump said of his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping.
But you would think it’s a sign of weakness if you called him?
“I don’t–I just look—”
It’s unclear what Trump was referring to at the time. Beijing denied that any recent conversation between the two leaders took place. The latest acknowledgement of direct contact was before Trump took office in January, when he posted on Truth Social that he “just spoke” to Xi and that the pair would “solve many problems together” and “do everything possible to make the World more peaceful and safe!”
Now, however, White House officials suggest a call between Trump and Xi may be imminent.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Sunday that he expected the two leaders will hold a call “very soon.” Trump “is going to have a wonderful conversation about the trade negotiations this week” with Xi, said National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett, a timeline reiterated by Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt to reporters on Monday: “I can confirm that the two leaders will likely talk this week.”
Here’s what to know about a potential call between Trump and Xi.
What would be on the agenda?
Trade will undoubtedly be the focus of any conversation between Trump and Xi.
The world’s two largest economies have been engaged in a trade war since Trump’s first term, though it dramatically escalated when Trump hiked “reciprocal” tariffs on China in April, raising the baseline levy on imports from China to 145%, while Beijing retaliated with a 125% tax on U.S. goods.
Both countries accused the other of playing unfairly, but in May, representatives from each side met in Geneva, where they reached a truce, temporarily reducing the tariffs amid continuing negotiations.
Read More: With Tariff Retreat, Trump Cedes Leverage to China
Another topic, albeit related, that is anticipated to come up is critical minerals, the rare earths used to manufacture a gamut of goods from auto parts and chips to munitions.
In a May 30 post on Truth Social, Trump referred to the Geneva agreement, claiming it was a gesture of kindness from the U.S.: “I saw what was happening and didn’t like it, for them, not for us. I made a FAST DEAL with China in order to save them from what I thought was going to be a very bad situation, and I didn’t want to see that happen. Because of this deal, everything quickly stabilized and China got back to business as usual. Everybody was happy! That is the good news!!! The bad news is that China, perhaps not surprisingly to some, HAS TOTALLY VIOLATED ITS AGREEMENT WITH US. So much for being Mr. NICE GUY!”
Speaking to CBS on Sunday, Bessent said that China had breached some of the terms of the Geneva agreement, particularly regarding export controls over rare earths and critical minerals. “I am confident that when President Trump and [Chinese Communist] Party Chairman Xi have a call, that this will be ironed out,” Bessent said. “But the fact that they are withholding some of the products that they agreed to release during our agreement—maybe it’s a glitch in the Chinese system, maybe it’s intentional.”
When Press Secretary Leavitt was asked Tuesday about whether the U.S. was pressuring China to release its hold on rare earths, she referred to the “leader-to-leader talk very soon.”
Read More: How Rare Earths Are Playing a Pivotal Role in the U.S.-China Trade War
Education policy may also be discussed. Recently the Trump Administration has made moves to restrict Chinese students at U.S. universities. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on May 28 that the U.S. will “aggressively revoke” the visas of Chinese students, including those with ties to the CCP and those studying in critical fields, because of national security concerns. Beijing firmly opposed the move, calling the policy “fully unjustified.”
China’s Ministry of Commerce on June 2 accused the U.S. of violating its side of the Geneva deal, saying that since the agreement the U.S. “has successively introduced a number of discriminatory restrictive measures” against China. According to the ministry, these include “issuing export control guidelines for AI chips, stopping the sale of chip design software to China, and announcing the revocation of Chinese student visas.”
Read More: How Trump’s Crackdown on International Students Could Escalate Trade Tensions With China
The inflow of fentanyl into the U.S. may also be a point of discussion, as the illegal narcotic that has been tied to some 48,000 deaths in 2024 in the U.S. was ostensibly the initial motivation behind Trump’s second-term tariff war.
What has each side said about the other?
“I like President Xi of China, always have, and always will, but he is VERY TOUGH, AND EXTREMELY HARD TO MAKE A DEAL WITH,” Trump said Wednesday in a post on Truth Social.
A person familiar with the trade talks told Politico that Trump is “obsessed” with getting Xi on the line, especially since relations have been strained by China’s alleged violations of the Geneva agreement.
A former official close to the White House also told Politico that Trump feels that “a call between principles is a way to cut through a lot of this noise, and get right to the heart of the matter.”
For China, the Trump Administration’s recent actions—on trade and student visas—“seriously violate the consensus reached by the two heads of state on January 17, seriously undermine the existing consensus of the Geneva economic and trade talks, and seriously damage China’s legitimate rights and interests,” said a Ministry of Commerce spokesperson on June 2.
Beijing, however, has also consistently repeated the need for “equal-footed dialogue and consultation with mutual respect” to iron out the trade dispute. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, after meeting with newly installed U.S. Ambassador to China David Perdue, said on Tuesday that the U.S. should “create the necessary conditions for China-U.S. relations to return to the right track” after it “introduced a series of negative measures on unfounded grounds.”
But analysts say that Xi is less inclined to approach deals via a call. “Donald Trump’s way” of “pick[ing] up the phone … to resolve issues,” Pang Zhongying, a former visiting senior fellow at the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore, told the South China Morning Post in February, is not the “Chinese way.”
According to Bloomberg’s John Liu, direct talks with Trump may not play well for Xi domestically, especially “if he’s seen as bowing to American pressure.” The Chinese President “doesn’t need the embarrassment of making nice with Trump,” wrote Liu in February. Plus, “keeping Trump at arm’s length has its benefits,” as the U.S. loses international standing over issues like the tariffs as well as continued support for Israel in its deadly war in Gaza, “it makes China appear like the more responsible global power.”
“I don’t think [China] wants to be caught unaware or caught by surprise with demands or things that it wasn’t expecting over the course of this phone conversation,” Huang Chin-hao of the National University of Singapore’s Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy tells TIME.
“Trump might fancy himself as a dealmaker, but Xi is not one to make sudden decisions on the fly,” says Kevin Chen Xian An, an associate research fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore. “The best we can hope for is that the two leaders can reach an understanding on certain principles that provide a modest boost to trade talks.”
