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U.S. President Donald Trump said Friday that his meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping next week will include "a lot of different deals," describing the two leaders' relationship as strong ahead of what will be China's first state visit to Washington in more than a decade.
"President Xi and I have a good relationship," Trump told reporters in the Oval Office.
"We're going to have a lot of different deals here ... We're going to have a very good meeting."
Trump said the U.S. and China "get along very well," pointing to tariffs on Chinese goods that he said had reached 145% before he reduced them, calling the higher level "really hurting them badly."
Xi is scheduled to arrive at Joint Base Andrews on Wednesday, where Trump will personally greet him, an unusual gesture, since Trump typically receives foreign leaders at the White House rather than the airport, according to senior administration officials cited by The Associated Press (AP).
The visit's centerpiece comes Thursday, when Trump and first lady Melania Trump welcome Xi and his wife, Peng Liyuan, at an arrival ceremony on the State Floor of the White House, followed by a troop review in the Rose Garden before the leaders retreat for private talks.
Peng and Melania Trump will hold a separate engagement while their husbands meet, though details were not released.
Xi and Peng will be guests of honor that evening at a state dinner in the East Room, where both leaders are expected to deliver remarks.
On Friday, Xi and Peng are scheduled to return to the White House for private tea with the Trumps, followed by a tour of the National Archives, before Xi departs for Joint Base Andrews.
Trump said he regretted that the White House's new ballroom, still under construction, would not be ready in time to host a larger crowd for the state dinner.
"It's too bad we don't have the ballroom open because if we did, we could have thousands, we could have 2,000 people having dinner," Trump said.
"We have a very tiny little room that's going to be squeezed out at about 125 or so people. But I literally could tell you that thousands of people would love to be at that dinner. This is a very tough ticket for me. I've told a lot of very good friends of mine, you just can't come," he added.
According to the White House, tech and business executives scheduled to attend the dinner include Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, Tesla and SpaceX's Elon Musk, Google's Sundar Pichai, Dell Technologies CEO Michael Dell, Nvidia's Jensen Huang, OpenAI's Sam Altman, Citigroup CEO Jane Fraser, and former Apple CEO Tim Cook.
A senior U.S. official who spoke to AP said that the dinner would be "a very popular and hot-ticketed event here in Washington, D.C."
Trump also acknowledged that the U.S. and China spy on one another. "Somebody said: 'Oh, they spy on us.' And I said: 'Maybe they do, but we spy on them, too,'" he said, adding that he would not disclose classified information.
U.S. officials briefing reporters said Washington and Beijing may be prepared to ease tariffs on a narrow band of nonstrategic goods that would benefit both sides, though they did not expect the U.S. to ease export controls to allow a greater flow of rare earth minerals, critical to products ranging from smartphones to fighter jets, into the global market.
Officials cited by AP said that China's maintaining an "acceptable flow" of the minerals would be discussed, but a reciprocal easing of U.S. export controls was considered unlikely.
Separately, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is set to meet Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng in New York over the weekend for economic and trade consultations that may extend into Monday at the working level, with artificial intelligence among the focus areas, according to a person familiar with the plans speaking to AP.
U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer will join Bessent for the meeting, his office said. China's commerce ministry said He would lead a delegation to the U.S. from Saturday to Wednesday.
Asked about China's economic ties to Iran, a second U.S. official said Washington would continue targeting Chinese and Hong Kong entities doing business with Tehran.
"As far as support for Iran, I think you have seen all along this year that the United States has imposed sanctions on Chinese entities, on entities in Hong Kong, that we have found to be facilitating any kind of revenue, oil, etc, business with Iran that contributes certainly to their war effort. I think that will continue going forward," the official told AP.
Trump visited China in May and during his first term, when Xi hosted him with an elaborate welcome.
Xi's visit next week marks his first state visit to the U.S. since September 2015, during the Obama administration.
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