Bessent-He Lifeng talks open ahead of Trump-Xi summit

Bessent-He Lifeng talks opened in New York on September 20, bringing U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng together four days before President Donald Trump is scheduled to meet President Xi Jinping in Washington. The officials are seeking to prepare possible summit measures on trade, artificial intelligence and critical minerals while a U.S.-China trade truce is due to expire on November 10, Reuters reported.

The meeting took place at JPMorgan Chase’s Manhattan headquarters. U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer was to participate, according to Reuters and CNBC. Bessent told reporters he expected “focused, fulsome and constructive” discussions that would set the stage for the leaders’ meeting.

In a post on X, Bessent said he and He were continuing talks on the bilateral economic and trade relationship. He said the discussions were intended to lay groundwork for Trump to pursue U.S. economic interests, CNBC reported.

What are Bessent and He Lifeng discussing?

The agenda includes tariffs, artificial intelligence, rare-earth magnets and other critical-mineral supplies, according to Reuters. The issues combine immediate trade negotiations with technology-policy questions that have become more prominent in the relationship between the world’s two largest national economies.

The November 10 deadline applies to the existing trade truce. Reuters reported that the earlier arrangement capped U.S. tariffs on Chinese goods at about 20% after reciprocal tariff increases had briefly pushed duties into triple-digit levels on both sides. CNBC reported that the truce also included Chinese commitments on rare-earth exports and U.S. agricultural purchases, while Washington reduced some tariffs and suspended higher reciprocal tariffs on Chinese goods.

Critical minerals are a central point of contention. China had committed to restore their flow to U.S. and global users under the truce, Reuters reported. A senior U.S. official said on September 19 that China’s performance had “not been up to par,” an assessment that has not been independently established in the reporting.

AI is also on the table. Reuters reported that Bessent expected the parties to discuss open- and closed-weight models, and that he has advocated guardrails aimed at preventing powerful models from reaching malign non-state actors. Open-weight models make their core model weights widely available, allowing users to download and adapt a system without training it from scratch, according to the U.S. National Telecommunications and Information Administration.

What could the New York talks produce?

The immediate task is to prepare potential understandings for the September 24 summit, rather than to announce a completed agreement. China’s Commerce Ministry said He would also lead a delegation of Chinese companies to the U.S. for the economic and trade consultations ahead of the summit, Reuters reported.

Anna Ashton, founder of Ashton Intelligence, told Reuters that the presidential meeting could produce some visible deliverables, but that a breakthrough was unlikely. She said the status quo was the general expectation for both sides.

No joint readout, deal, extension of the truce or summit outcome was established in the available reporting as the New York meeting began.

This story draws on original reporting from CNBC.