US President Donald Trump plans to travel to China from March 31 to April 2 for a meeting with his counterpart Xi Jinping as the two leaders will look to navigate a trade relationship again plunged into uncertainty and navigate tensions around Taiwan.
The planned meeting comes as the Supreme Court on Friday moved to strike down sweeping US tariffs on exports, which seems certain to jumble the dynamics around efforts to extend a truce negotiated last year following months of tit-for-tat tariff escalations.
“I’m going to be going to China in April, that’s going to be a wild one,” Trump said Thursday during the first meeting of the Board of Peace in Washington.
The US president said he expects a welcome that includes pomp and ceremony that surpasses his visit to Beijing in 2017 during his first term.
“President Xi, he treated me so well, he gave me a display, I never saw so many soldiers all the same height, exactly the same height,” Trump said. “But I said, ‘You’ve got to top it.’ He said, ‘I’ll top it. We’re going to top it.’”
Trump has said he also expects to welcome Xi to Washington later this year, and the Chinese president is expected to attend a meeting of the Group of 20 nations in Florida.
It’s a marked change from the dynamic between the US and China early last year, when a series of tit-for-tat tariff hikes and export curbs rattled global financial markets and raised fears of an economic downturn. Following months of talks, Trump and Xi reached a one-year agreement last October to lower duties and export restrictions.
Beijing’s main objective in the upcoming talks is extending that truce and officials are likely to push for further tariff rollbacks and an easing of restrictions on the shipment of advanced artificial-intelligence chips, the Wall Street Journal reported on Feb. 18, citing unnamed people close to the Chinese government.
Friday’s tariff ruling will likely strengthen Beijing’s hand and could make Trump’s expected asks for large quantities of soybean purchases, Boeing Co. aircraft, and energy exports a tougher sell.
Narrowing trade deficits have been a persistent focus of Trump. The US’s annual shortfall with China shrank in 2025 to about $202 billion — a 21-year low, according to Commerce Department data.
Simmering political tensions — including around Taiwan, the self-ruled island China considers its territory, and US moves in South America — also threaten to intrude on any detente. Xi told Trump in a February phone call that Beijing would never allow Taiwan to be separated and warned the US should handle arms sales to Taipei with “utmost caution,” according to the Chinese government.
Washington approved a package of arms sales to Taiwan worth as much as $11 billion in December, and Taiwan’s foreign ministry said the US has continued its policy of normalizing arms sales to the island. The December announcement drew swift condemnation from Beijing, though Xi stopped short of demanding Trump halt the sales altogether.
Taiwan has been trying to bolster its defenses to deter escalating Chinese pressure. The government in Taipei rejects Beijing’s claims to Taiwan, as the self-governing island seeks greater international recognition.
A series of Trump administration moves to pressure Iran and play a more muscular role in Central and South America has also affected China. The US capture of Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro — a key ally of China in the region — earlier this year has been followed by American efforts to enforce sanctions against the trading of some of the country’s crude, with China having been a top buyer.
At the same time, Trump has sought to pressure Iran with threatened tariffs on countries doing business with the Islamic republic, a risk to China, the world’s top buyer of its oil.
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