24-Hour Documentary: Trump Sorts Out Journalists, Clash With Chinese Journalists, Xi Pressures Him on Taiwan

Washington, D.C. (KB) - Granite forms under pressure. It carries whatever is placed on it and stays silent about it. On Thursday, Donald Trump discovered a man who appreciates that silence. During a walk around the White House grounds, he introduced Xi Jinping to reporters as an expert on stone. Xi loves good granite, he assured them. His guest stood beside him. His expression reportedly did not change. Maybe he understood more about the material than his host realized. The day began in the grammar of power. A red carpet, military honors on top of it. The flags of both countries side by side, as if proximity alone were enough for harmony. Hundreds of service members stood ready. Above their heads, a B-2 stealth bomber flew by, an aircraft built not to be seen, displayed on a day when everything wanted to be seen. Donald and Melania Trump welcomed Xi and his wife Peng Liyuan. Every image was meant to prove greatness. Greatness, however, needs witnesses, and witnesses see more than they are shown.

A photograph is a witness that cannot talk back. Donald Trump posted one such witness on Truth Social on Thursday. Himself, standing motionless and saluting beside the newly arrived Chinese President Xi Jinping on the tarmac at Joint Base Andrews. A military jet flies above them. The image was apparently created by artificial intelligence, and it shows a day that never happened that way. Hardly anyone noticed. A photograph cannot talk back. So Trump simply has one painted. On the real tarmac, two wives were walking alongside them, and one president flinched when the bomber came over. In the image, a hero salutes beneath creatures from outer space. Trump has already decided which of the two days is supposed to go down in history.

Outside, the world looked different. Supporters of Beijing and opponents of the Chinese government stood only a few streets apart, with a dense police line between them. Here, the Chinese national anthem. There, Tibetan flags in the wind. Another march moved toward the White House, with calls for freedom for Taiwan and an end to the genocide of the Uyghurs. Jimmy Lai's name also echoed across the pavement. A state guest never travels alone. The people his state has power over travel with him, and some of them now only make the trip on cardboard signs.

President Xi is greeted by President Trump. At the beginning, protesters can be heard more or less clearly in the background, while in the final third of the recording they can be heard very clearly.

The first cracks appeared exactly where the pictures were supposed to be made. Even before Xi arrived, the press corps traveling with him crowded around the best spots, and the dispute over camera positions got loud. Chinese journalists and photographers reportedly simply ignored some Secret Service instructions to change positions.

The woman in the red jacket, the Chinese delegation's press coordinator, argues with a Chinese photographer, surrounded by security personnel and camera lenses. In another scene, a security officer physically pushes a Chinese photographer out of the area. Later, a Chinese photographer reportedly shoved an American journalist aside on the way to an event. Additional security forces were stationed around the White House and Lafayette Park, and credentials were checked at access points. What was surprising was that the first people to disrupt the order were precisely those who were supposed to capture that order for audiences back home. Protocol can prescribe every step. It cannot reach the elbow.

Inside the Oval Office came a line no satirist could have placed better. The Chinese press was especially friendly, Trump reportedly said during the photo opportunity, according to photographers who were there. Outside, the pushing and shoving was already behind everyone involved. Whether Trump knew about it cannot be said. Words and reality went their separate ways that day.

The White House had a different problem with its own press, and this one was homemade. Several news organizations were fighting the administration over their access. Because certain journalists had been excluded, major American television networks did not provide a joint live broadcast at the start of the meeting. A meeting between the presidents of the United States and China, normally the kind of event that interrupts regular programming, began instead as a side story in an internal White House fight over press passes. It was not until around noon that the affected reporters got their access back. The door was open again. For a few hours.

That evening, the sorting started again, more selectively this time, with tweezers. CNN and MS NOW were technically credentialed again. According to their own accounts, however, certain journalists were still not allowed to cover Xi's arrival and the guests entering through the North Portico. CNN was allowed to send a photographer and an audio technician. A reporter and producer were turned away. At MS NOW, journalist Laura Barrón-López had to remain outside while other reporters and producers from the network were allowed in. Politico was not named among those affected that evening. The joint television coverage remained suspended throughout the evening. The camera lens and microphone were welcome, the question was not. An eye without a voice does not disturb a celebration. None of this had anything to do with the pushing among the Chinese photographers: There, elbows did the shoving. Here, a list made the decision. During the day, the president praised the friendliness of foreign journalists. By evening, he was sorting his own by name.

Trump and Xi spent around three hours together on Thursday. They negotiated over trade and artificial intelligence. Taiwan came up, as did the Middle East. Then the war in Ukraine. Between the world's two largest economies, almost every economic decision now carries a claim to power. And every question of power comes with a price list. Trump publicly spoke the language of male friendship. He and Xi had developed a "truly great friendship." At the banquet, he went even further: Never had the two understood each other better. Almost nothing remained this time of the often aggressive rhetoric toward China from earlier years. Words can be replaced overnight. Interests cannot.

Xi answered more quietly and in longer lines. He spoke in conditions. The interests of both countries were deeply interconnected, he said, and they should avoid conflict and confrontation. Military communication between the two countries needed to improve. Competition had to remain limited. Once again, he invoked the so-called Thucydides Trap, the idea that the rise of a new power and the old power's fear of that rise can drive both into war. Some ideas do not age. They wait. Trump talked about feelings, Xi about rules. Friendship can be proclaimed. Conditions have to be met.

Xi called for fair treatment of Chinese companies in the United States. China's door was wide open to American companies that wanted to invest and do business there, he said. Economically, it remained a pause for breath. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent had said that both sides had extended their trade truce by another two months. Instead of expiring on November 10, it would now run until January 10. The major disputes were postponed, including tariffs and Chinese purchases of American goods. The same goes for rare earths. Restrictions on technology trade also stayed where they were. What has been gained is time, the cheapest raw material in politics. It is nowhere close to peace in the trade dispute. Xi certainly did not arrive as a supplicant. Even before the summit, reports said he was traveling to Washington with a strong Chinese trade position. Beijing controls critical minerals. It can also dangle purchases of American agricultural products and aircraft. A country that can deliver does not have to beg. It can wait, and waiting is a form of pressure.

Chinese cars remain a sore subject. Trump showed himself open to Chinese manufacturers producing in the United States, provided they employed American workers. The domestic auto industry is pulling in the opposite direction. Its representatives are demanding that he make it even harder for Chinese manufacturers to sell and produce vehicles in the United States. A 100 percent tariff and restrictions on connected Chinese vehicles already make imports extremely difficult in practice. On artificial intelligence, humans must remain in control, Xi warned. Both governments could discuss the risks and benefits and work together against misuse. Trump returned to one of his favorite words, "superintelligence." Security and technology were among the urgent issues of this meeting, he had told Xi, and decisions in those areas could promote peace and prosperity for decades. Big words cost nothing during state visits. The bill comes later, as a tariff or an export ban. Sometimes as a military budget.

Under the politeness, a hard dispute is simmering. American developers accuse Chinese companies of taking capabilities from existing systems for their own models, using a process that transfers the knowledge of powerful systems to smaller models. American providers use the same technology themselves within their own product families. Only their most powerful systems are supposed to remain off limits to competitors. Courts have not yet settled the decisive legal questions. Imitation is called learning when you do it yourself. When the other side does it, it is called theft.

Xi was toughest on Taiwan. According to the official Chinese account, he demanded that Trump keep the United States on the "right position" of opposing Taiwanese independence. The Taiwan issue had to be handled "with caution." Diplomatically, that carries weight. The established American formula is that Washington does not support Taiwanese independence. Opposing it goes further. If Washington adopted that demand, distance would turn into opposition, and the American position would move a significant step toward Beijing. The Trump administration initially did not respond publicly to this demand, reports after the meeting explicitly noted. Silence can be restraint. It can also be giving ground before anyone has given it a name.

Behind the words lies a very real source of pressure: weapons. Even before the meeting, reports said Xi had repeatedly raised Taiwan with Trump during their meeting in Beijing. The issue involved American arms deliveries and the question of how far Washington would go to defend the island. Trump himself has described a pending $14 billion weapons package as bargaining leverage with China. With that word, the security of an island becomes a stake on a gaming table where the island itself has no seat. Xi does not have to threaten. He only has to ask what the stake costs.

Two Americans were missing from the table and were still in the room. Washington considers both of them wrongfully detained in China. Seismologist Youlin Chen was arrested in 2024 while visiting relatives in Beijing and accused of espionage; his family and colleagues reject the allegation. Political scientist U Min Zin was arrested in June while traveling to a conference. His wife says he has not been given access to his Chinese lawyers. She does not know where he is being held. The families were hoping Trump himself would intervene. Representatives of the State Department and the National Security Council had assured her that Trump would raise both cases with Xi, Chen's wife says. Supporters of Jimmy Lai, who is imprisoned in Hong Kong, also demanded that the president raise the issue of his release. Whether any of this was discussed, and with what result, initially remained unclear. A woman who does not know where her husband is lives in a time without a place. No state visit has a scheduled event for that kind of time.

Then came the part of the day that seemed to matter most to Trump. He took his guest through the construction site of his planned ballroom and showed him the project for a new helicopter landing pad. This was where the line about granite came, turning Xi into an architectural expert. Trump has repeatedly used Beijing's Great Hall of the People as a comparison for his own building. The monumental structure on Tiananmen Square covers more than 167,000 square meters across 4 levels, and its central hall holds around 10,000 people. Trump's ballroom is supposed to cover around 8,400 square meters. He had announced that it would surpass everything. The numbers contradict that by a factor of 20. A man measures himself against a palace and shows the head of state whose country owns the original a construction pit.

Mao Zedong had the Great Hall built in 1958. It was standing in less than a year, right in the middle of the Great Leap Forward. According to estimates by many scholars, at least 20 million people died in the famine caused by Mao's policies. Monuments are finished faster than the memory of their price. They have basements full of history, and on guided tours those basements remain locked. On Thursday, nobody asked for the key. Both presidents ignored questions about Iran and Taiwan during the walk. There was no word about Jimmy Lai either. Trump stopped only to explain the granite.

And then came the image that has been written about most ever since. Trump made sure to take his guest to the image that occupies Joe Biden's place in his presidential gallery. Instead of a portrait of his predecessor, there hangs a photograph of an autopen, the machine that signs names without a hand doing the signing. Trump accuses Biden of having signed documents that way. A president shows the head of state of a rival world power how he mocks his predecessor. Nobody knows what Xi thought about it, and any answer would be made up. A machine that writes names where no person signs anymore, hanging as wall decoration in a government that frames its resentment. Power loves mirrors. Some would rather hang an enemy on the wall.

Xi had gentler goods with him. China would send two pandas to Atlanta, he announced, Ping Ping and Fu Shuang. They continue a tradition that has served as soft padding beneath a hard relationship since Richard Nixon's trip to China in 1972. Black-and-white fur soothes for a moment what no stealth bomber can soothe. Xi also invited 100,000 American students to visit China over the next five years. Trump had previously said he wanted to allow an additional 600,000 Chinese students to study at American universities. The governments talk about strategic rivalry while at the same time sending their young people across the Pacific in both directions.

Trump responded with a large eagle statue. The bald eagle, national symbol of the United States, went to the Chinese president. Nothing about this visit was supposed to be accidental, and power keeps its animals. China sends pandas that breathe. America gives away an eagle that stays still.

By evening, politics had turned into a dinner table. More than 130 guests had been invited. Jeff Bezos came, as did Elon Musk. Jensen Huang had a seat, along with Sam Altman. Tim Cook was invited, and so was Mark Zuckerberg. Leading figures from finance and industry were there as well. Members of the administration were invited, along with several members of the Trump family. Melania Trump sat at the main table next to Elon Musk, Tim Cook next to Peng Liyuan. At the same table sat people whose companies depend on decisions that had been negotiated only a few hours earlier. Between the negotiating room and the dining room there was only a hallway.

Chief Justice John Roberts was also invited, along with Justices Amy Coney Barrett and Brett Kavanaugh. Trump had previously attacked judges on that court publicly. Now the government and corporate America shared the same formal evening. The judiciary was sitting there too. For a few hours, the separation of powers put a napkin in its lap.

Something was noticeably missing. Not a single Chinese company appeared on the published guest list. Several leading Chinese executives had traveled to Washington shortly before the summit, though separately from Xi's delegation. Numerous major Chinese internet and auto companies are under American restrictions because of alleged ties to the Chinese military. Their presence would have created a very different problem for Washington.

Trump stuck to the planned program at the state banquet with Xi Jinping only briefly. Then he said he "just had to do it" and spontaneously invited the entire room, including Xi and Peng Liyuan, to tour his unfinished ballroom construction site. Through a specially lit passageway, the guests were supposed to get a first look at the project, which Trump said presidents had wanted for 150 years and which was expected to be finished in about 1 year. Other hosts might serve coffee after dinner. Trump served up another construction tour.

Trump opened his dinner speech with history, with a Chinese delegation that had come to the United States 158 years earlier. Then he said he wanted to go off script for a moment. The room laughed and applauded. What had to follow, followed: the ballroom construction site. It was beautiful and clean and shiny, he said, and unfortunately had not been finished in time for this dinner. The ballroom followed him through the entire day, from the walk-through to the dinner table. Other presidents leave behind treaties. This one is planning a ballroom.

Xi answered with deeper history. George Washington had collected Chinese porcelain, he recalled, then moved on to Nixon's opening to China and ping-pong diplomacy. He also invoked cooperation between the two countries during World War II. This friendship forged in "blood and fire" would continue for generations. The present had to wait outside the door. China's nuclear buildup was not explored in the dinner speeches. Taiwan did not get much attention during the toast; Xi had already put the subject on the table during the negotiations. Xi preferred to speak of a historic turning point. In less than 6 months, he and Trump had already met twice and held open, in-depth discussions. A common understanding had been reached on many issues. The past is the most comfortable tense at state banquets. It does not argue back.

Xi went furthest when he connected Trump's slogan to his own. The "great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation" and Trump's goal of making America great again could reinforce each other. It sounded like a compliment. In reality, the sentence placed 2 nations that both long for a lost greatness at the same table. Each one thinks it is the host.

The menu followed the same polite geometry. Sesame-crusted sea bass, with bok choy on the side. Red tablecloths and red flowers were meant, according to the White House, to reflect the importance of the color in China. The toast was made with a California sparkling wine from the same brand Nixon drank during his 1972 visit to Beijing. Even the glass carried history. After the speeches, the public portion ended, and the rest of the evening remained behind closed doors. A day that had begun with a bomber and protests faded out by candlelight and porcelain.

Little tangible remained, less at least than what appeared on the guest list. The trade truce has been extended, the rest postponed. In November, China will host the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in Shenzhen, followed in December by the G20 summit in Miami. According to the Chinese summary, Trump and Xi agreed to support each other in successfully hosting both meetings. More meetings between them this year are therefore possible.

Trump got his big day with Xi. Soldiers stood at attention, and the country's corporate giants came to dinner. He even got to explain the future ballroom to his guest. At the same time, Xi's photographers were wrestling with the Secret Service, and American news organizations were fighting to get through the door. Somewhere between global politics and granite, the path eventually led to an autograph machine hanging on a wall.

Xi Jinping said nothing publicly about it. He had already said what mattered, on Taiwan, quietly and unmistakably. Granite forms under pressure. On Thursday, he passed that pressure on.