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After eight years of trade wars! Trump’s "urgent" visit to China, what signals does it really reveal?

On May 13, 2026, U.S. President Trump landed at Beijing Capital International Airport, marking nearly nine years since a sitting U.S. president last set foot on Chinese soil!

Nine years have passed, and the world has changed dramatically. The U.S. and China have fought trade wars, tech wars, caused balloon incidents, argued over TikTok, and repeatedly tested each other's resolve on the Taiwan Strait issue.

Despite all this, Trump still came. He was accompanied by Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg, Apple CEO Tim Cook, Tesla’s Musk, Citigroup’s Jane Fraser, along with leaders from over a dozen major American companies like Qualcomm and Micron, arriving in Beijing in a grand procession.

Nvidia founder Jensen Huang was initially on the rumored list, but later, the White House’s announced list of 16 people did not include him. However, according to Bloomberg today, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang will join as a temporary addition, traveling with President Trump to China!

This trip shows that the U.S. is really in a hurry.
The first detail that caught the public’s attention was a tug-of-war inside the White House.

The China visit list was delayed repeatedly. Hardline figures like U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai and others kept pushing to reduce the size of the accompanying business delegation, arguing that bringing too many CEOs to Beijing would make the U.S. seem overly eager to do business, weakening its bargaining position.

Ultimately, the U.S. announced a list of 16 business representatives plus the temporarily added Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang. This itself signals a problem. The U.S. business community, exhausted from the recent decoupling narrative, is now eager to seize the opportunity to negotiate deals.

At the presidential level, this visit was postponed by at least two months. Originally scheduled for March, it was shelved due to the U.S.-Iran conflict. The Middle East war that started in late February lasted over two months. The Strait of Hormuz was highly tense, global energy supplies were tight, and oil prices surged over 50% in 70 days. Brent crude remains above $100 per barrel.

On April 7, all parties agreed to a 30-day ceasefire, and a peace memorandum was finalized in early May. But by May 11, Trump himself admitted at a White House press conference that the ceasefire was extremely fragile!

Therefore, Trump needs China. Meanwhile, during the same period, the first bipartisan U.S. Senate delegation in history quietly arrived in Beijing, led by Republican Senator Daines (a China veteran who worked at Procter & Gamble in the 1990s and has spent six years in mainland China and Hong Kong).

Behind this is a very pragmatic logic: As of April 6, the U.S.-Iran conflict had already cost over $42 billion in direct military expenses, with daily spending between $500 million and $900 million. The Pentagon urgently requested an additional $200 billion in budget. U.S. bases in the Middle East suffered continuous damage, and the longer the conflict dragged on, the louder the anti-war voices at home.

And November 2026 is the U.S. midterm elections. Trump’s overall approval rating has fallen from 52% early in his term to 39%, with economic policy support at -25%. The Democratic Party is predicted to win the House of Representatives with an 82% chance. Gasoline prices surged over 50% in 70 days, now averaging over $4.50 per gallon.

Trump himself has rarely publicly admitted that oil prices might stay high until the midterm elections in November.

He needs to reach at least a passable conclusion on the Middle East issue, and China is the most influential country for Iran—about 90% of Iran’s oil exports go to China.

The real demand behind the U.S. business delegation

Boeing’s situation is typical. The last time China purchased nearly 500 Boeing aircraft was almost a decade ago. As U.S.-China relations worsened, Chinese airlines turned heavily to Airbus, which in 2022 alone ordered 292 aircraft from Airbus. Boeing’s share in the world’s largest aviation market shrank sharply.

Apple’s logic is about the supply chain. China remains the core manufacturing base for iPhones. No matter how loudly the decoupling story is told, Tim Cook’s visits to Beijing are more about certainty than geopolitical slogans. He wants stability.

Qualcomm and Micron are there to keep a door open for semiconductor export controls negotiations. Chip bans not only cut off the Chinese market but also cause tangible revenue losses for these companies.

The list of 16 CEOs is essentially a pain point list of the U.S. industry. They are coming not because of Trump’s personal appeal, but because their businesses depend heavily on the Chinese market.

Eight years of trade war over nine years

In 2017, during Trump’s visit to China, he drank tea at Baoen Tower in the Forbidden City, in a friendly atmosphere. The front page of People’s Daily featured a large photo. Back then, the trade war hadn’t started, Huawei hadn’t been blacklisted, TSMC hadn’t been asked to build factories in the U.S., and the chip bill was just a shadow.

But by 2026, the background is completely different. Multiple rounds of tariffs, the chip act already implemented, rare earth export controls turned into China’s leverage, TikTok had two forced sale episodes, and tensions in the Taiwan Strait are several times higher than in 2017.

Yet, Trump still came, and China still hosted him.

Sitting face-to-face as two rivals with no mutual trust is itself more meaningful than any communiqué or joint statement. As for what can be achieved—whether Boeing’s 500 aircraft can be signed, whether tariffs can be temporarily paused, who will ensure the security of the Strait of Hormuz, or how far the rare earth valves will be turned—these are issues both sides will wrestle with over the next two days.

Being able to sit down and talk at least shows that both sides believe dialogue is more important than not talking. In the current international landscape, this visit and negotiation itself is already a signal.