A Strengthened China Comes to the White House

By Amy L. Glover Drake

For President Xi Jinping, this has been a year of unexpected gifts from the United States. Most notably, Washington’s decision to attack Iran has stretched U.S. military resources and diverted attention away from the Pacific. President Donald Trump is also welcoming his Chinese counterpart at a moment of domestic weakness. The latest Reuters poll puts his approval rating at 32%, while rising energy and grocery prices are weighing on the administration ahead of the November 3 midterm elections.

What Beijing does not welcome, however, is a world marked by growing instability, which creates additional risks and makes long-term planning more difficult. That is why, as my colleague Rina Mussali Galante emphasized in our most recent conversation on her program Vértice Internacional, perhaps the most encouraging aspect of this visit is simply that it will mark the third face-to-face meeting between the leaders of China and the United States in the past 12 months.