Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Tuesday he’ll meet this weekend with his Chinese counterpart, He Lifeng, ahead of the summit between President Donald Trump and Xi Jinping set for Sept. 24 in Washington.
Earlier, Bloomberg News reported the US and China are discussing lowering tariffs on certain goods. Next week’s meetings are also likely to result in an agreement to cut duties on Chinese inputs for manufacturers, according to people familiar with the matter.
The moves are expected to be carried out under an earlier plan for reciprocal tariff cuts on roughly $30 billion in trade. Most-favored-nation rates would be applied to some items from China, said the people, who requested anonymity in order to discuss private conversations.
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An extension of the one-year trade truce would remove one potential stumbling block for a world economy grappling with wars in Iran and Ukraine, elevated oil prices and rekindling inflation concerns that are pushing up global borrowing costs. Still, expectations for the summit remain tempered by China’s relations with Iran and Russia as well as competition over leading-edge technologies such as artificial intelligence.
Bessent, speaking before the House Financial Services Committee, said he looked forward to speaking with the Chinese vice premier about sanctions related to the war in Iran as the US increases economic pressure on the Islamic Republic.
Echoing Trump, the Treasury secretary has consistently emphasized the importance of maintaining the US lead over China in AI, an area where Chinese firms have been gaining ground on their Silicon Valley rivals.
“It does matter whether the good guys or the bad guys have this,” Bessent said. “As a person who manages the relationship with China on AI, it matters a great deal.”
Competition over AI has emerged as a key source of friction.
Last week, three US national security agencies accused Chinese AI firms including DeepSeek and Moonshot AI – the maker of the breakthrough Kimi K3 model – of systematically extracting proprietary knowledge from American firms. While the Chinese companies have refrained from commenting on the US allegations, China’s government has pushed back forcefully on the claims.
Authorities in Beijing similarly have criticized calls from leading US AI developers Anthropic PBC and OpenAI for a slowdown in work on advanced models as “fearmongering,” signaling their concern that American firms could be pressuring the Trump administration to further restrict China’s access to advanced chips and other hardware.
The high-level talks are the latest signal that the meeting between the leaders of the world’s two largest economies remains on track. Trump has said Xi would visit the White House on Sept. 24, an event that would also include a state dinner. China hasn’t confirmed dates for Xi’s travel yet, something it tends to do only days in advance.
Bessent didn’t specify the date or location of his meeting with He. The Financial Times reported they’ll meet in New York on Sunday. The two men have typically met before each of the US-China leaders’ summits to lay the groundwork for the talks.
CEO Delegation
Highlighting the central role that agriculture is likely to play in discussions, representatives from state-owned food trading firm Cofco may join Xi when he travels to the US, according to two people familiar with the matter. More than a dozen firms are also being considered for a CEO delegation, though a final decision hasn’t been reached, according to the people.
For his state visit in May, Trump brought more than a dozen CEOs to China, including Nvidia Corp.’s Jensen Huang and Tesla Inc.’s Elon Musk. The executives met with Premier Li Qiang, and Xi told them that US enterprises “are deeply involved in China’s reform and opening up, a process from which both sides have benefited.”
