As Trump prepares to meet Xi, experts say he is ‘inclined to win’ | Donald Trump News

With the leaders of the United States and China meeting this week, experts say now is a good time for President Xi Jinping to talk. The US is preoccupied with war in the Middle East, and President Donald Trump’s admission is happening at home: he wants to win, which will put China on top.

Trade between the world’s two largest economies has been disrupted since Trump returned to office last year and imposed tariffs around the world, imposing the highest tariffs on China, 145 percent at one point.

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Beijing retaliated with tariffs and halted exports of the world’s steel, which is key to a range of industries, including cars and mobile phones, that China dominates.

Although things have changed a bit since the peak of that cold spell, it’s not good.

“The trade relationship was severely disrupted. US imports from China were down 25 percent and exports to China were down 25 percent or more. These are huge numbers in one year,” said Chad Bown, Reginald Jones senior fellow at the Peterson Institute of International Economics (PIIE).

“It seems that there is no evidence to show that the affair was bad.”

By one estimate, US exports to China would have risen by nearly 60 percent in 2025, or about $90bn a year, without Trump’s trade war, Bown says.

Although US imports from China fell – down 4 percent in 2025 to 9 percent of goods – imports from other countries rose 9 percent, according to PIIE’s Bown, as businesses agreed to higher taxes imposed on China to move to other countries, including Mexico, Vietnam and Taiwan.

China’s trade surplus it rose to an all-time high of nearly $1.2 trillion last year when it made less trade with the US by increasing trade with other parts of the world, showing that “it has moved away from its dependence on the US,” said Dexter Tiff Roberts, director of the Global China Hub at the Atlantic Council.

Tensions between the two countries continued even after that they met at the end of October in South Korea on the sidelines of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit, and it hasn’t slowed down much since then.

“This is an important trip,” said Wei Liang, a professor at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies in Monterey. “In the meantime, it’s been confusing, and both sides have lost hope in what they can do together.”

This is Trump’s first trip to China since 2017, and he arrived in Beijing on Wednesday, ahead of talks on Thursday and Friday.

Experts agree that China has power.

First, its export was not difficult. Also, it has built a gas pipeline through Central Asia, getting some of its energy needs, and is not affected by the war in Iran or elsewhere.

“Right now is a good time for Xi to discuss this because the US is busy with war, and at home, Trump’s opinion is low, and he needs to win, especially the mid-term elections coming to the US in November,” said Liang.

A Reuters/Ipsos poll late last month showed 34 percent of Americans approve of Trump’s handling of the White House, down from 36 percent in an earlier Reuters/Ipsos poll in mid-April. Trump’s approval rating with the US public has fallen sharply since he took office in January 2025, when it was 47 percent.

The US-Israel war on Iran and its retaliation in the Strait of Hormuz, an oil and gas hub, has caused energy prices to rise. On Monday, the international benchmark, Brent crude, rose 3 percent from Friday near $104 after Trump said that the cessation of hostilities with Iran was “life-saving”. That sent prices at the pump to around $4.48 per gallon on Monday, according to GasBuddy data, with other states seeing more pain at $6.10 in California, $5.72 in Washington and $5.60 in Hawaii.

On Tuesday, data from the US Department of Labor showed that consumer price inflation rose to 3.8 percent from a year ago, as the war with Iran raised energy prices.

“Xi has no pressure at home, but Trump will be willing to agree on something so that he can deliver it at home… he is interested,” Liang said.

Although Beijing’s demand is not as urgent as Washington’s, it knows that tariff and trade disputes are volatile and is therefore willing to negotiate, especially when it has power, experts say.

China has always wanted to acquire high-tech chips, or manufacturing equipment, to develop its own business and technology, and to adopt Taiwan.

The US will also seek China’s help in reopening the Strait of Hormuz with its ally Iran.

“They’re calling on China to help with the cruise — it’s amazing that the White House has gone that far,” the Atlantic Council’s Roberts told Al Jazeera.

In exchange, the US wants China to sell big-ticket items, including soybeans, Boeing airplanes and electricity, such as coal and natural gas.

“A lot of what the US is trying to accomplish now is to repair the damage it did in the past,” Roberts said. “China knows and wonders about their good fortune. They can keep quiet and let the US destroy its reputation around the world.”