Biden, Xi speak for first time in months

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President Joe Biden held his first conversation with Chinese leader Xi Jinping in nearly five months on Tuesday, as the U.S. seeks to manage tensions with China and advance cooperation on military communications and combating fentanyl.

The call was wide-ranging and covered global conflicts as well as friction over technology curbs, Taiwan, and China’s aggressive military behavior in the South China Sea.

Speaking ahead of the call, a senior Biden administration official said the president planned to push for more action on counternarcotics, after the two leaders agreed to cooperation at their meeting in San Francisco last November.

Both the White House and Chinese Foreign Ministry readouts described the conversation as “candid and constructive.” The White House said that Biden “emphasized the importance of maintaining peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait and the rule of law and freedom of navigation in the South China Sea.”

Biden also raised concerns about China’s “support for Russia’s defense industrial base,” the readout said, an indication that he pressed Xi on Beijing’s pro-Moscow stance in the Ukraine war. A U.S. intelligence report released last year said that Chinese technology had become increasingly important for Russia in the war.

According to the Chinese readout, Xi cautioned Biden over U.S. efforts to “de-risk” supply chains and place curbs on high-tech exports to China, and warned the U.S. not to cross a “red line” on Taiwan. “In the face of ‘Taiwan independence’ separatist activities and external encouragement and support for them, China is not going to sit on its hands,” the readout said.

The two leaders also discussed U.S. legislation that would force a sale of TikTok, the popular video app that has triggered scrutiny in Washington due to its Chinese ownership. The U.S. Congress is currently considering legislation backed by the White House that would force China-based ByteDance to divest TikTok or would otherwise effectively ban the app in the U.S.

“The president reiterated our concerns about the ownership of TikTok,” White House national security spokesman John Kirby told reporters Tuesday afternoon. “He made it clear to President Xi that this was not about a ban of the application but rather our interest in divestiture so that the national security interests and the data security of the American people can be protected.”

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The call is the latest instance of the Biden administration trying to increase communication with China to navigate the complex relationship between Washington and Beijing. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, who recently publicly criticized China’s use of subsidies, is expected to soon travel to China, while Secretary of State Antony Blinken plans to visit in the coming weeks, the senior administration official said.

The White House is trying to manage tensions with China over issues including U.S. technology curbs, but officials also see opportunity for limited cooperation with Beijing on issues like climate change and artificial intelligence.

“Intense competition requires intense diplomacy to manage tensions, address misperceptions, and prevent unintended conflict, and this call is one way to do that,” the senior administration official told reporters ahead of the conversation between the two leaders.

The U.S. and China are working to set up a dialogue on AI “in the coming weeks,” after a channel was agreed to by Biden and Xi at the San Francisco summit, the official said.

The U.S. also anticipates more progress on restoring military-to-military communications that were severed following then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s trip to Taiwan in 2022. Operator-level talks between maritime officials will take place in Honolulu, Hawaii this week, the official said, while the administration is preparing for talks between Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and his counterpart in the “coming months.”

Still, the administration sought to manage expectations for Tuesday’s call. The administration official described it as a “check in” and said there wouldn’t be specific announcements out of it. The two leaders haven’t actually spoken by phone since July 2022, and their last conversation was at the November summit.

Notable

• The engagement comes days after Xi met with American CEOs in an attempt to assure them of the business environment in China.

• China is increasing its efforts to influence the U.S. election, the New York Times reported, despite a pledge by Xi not to interfere.

• China recently co-sponsored a United Nations resolution on AI, a victory for the U.S.