President-elect Donald Trump invited Chinese President Xi Jinping to attend his inauguration next month, according to a report.
The invitation came in early November after Trump’s election victory, CBS News reported Thursday. The revelation comes a month after Trump promised to impose hefty tariffs on China.
Transition spokesperson Karoline Leavitt confirmed that the Chinese leader had been invited during an appearance on Fox & Friends Thursday morning.
This invitation was an example of Trump “creating an open dialogue with leaders of countries that are not just our allies but our adversaries and our competitors too,” she said.
When asked if he had accepted or declined the invitation, Leavitt said: “To be determined.”
She didn’t name other world leaders who were invited or planned to attend. But, she added: “Foreign leaders are lining up to talk to Donald Trump right now.”
Trump recently spoke with Justin Trudeau at Mar-a-Lago, had a “great call” with the president of Mexico, and got the “full presidential celebration” when visiting France for the reopening Notre Dame in Paris, and met with Italy’s prime minister, she said.
Last month Trump threatened to impose 25 percent tariffs on imported goods from Mexico and Canada as well as an additional 10 percent tariffs on goods from China. These three countries represent the U.S.’s top trading partners.
“Drugs are pouring into our Country, mostly through Mexico, at levels never seen before,” Trump wrote on Truth Social last month. “Until such time as they stop, we will be charging China an additional 10% Tariff, above any additional Tariffs, on all of their many products coming into the United States of America.”
In response, a spokesperson for China’s embassy in the U.S. wrote on X: “China-US economic and trade cooperation is mutually beneficial in nature. No one will win a trade war or a tariff war.”
In the aftermath of Trump’s election victory, some experts have been warning about how tariffs could impact consumers and could lead to inflation.
Over the summer, a group of Nobel prize winners wrote a letter warning about Trump’s economic plans, saying his policies could have a “destabilizing effect.”
An analysis into how Trump’s proposed tariffs could impact US consumers and businesses, conducted by the think tank Peterson Institute for International Economics, concluded: “The only certainty is that new tariffs will be costly for the United States.”
The president-elect said Sunday on NBC News that he can’t promise that tariffs won’t hurt Americans’ wallets.
“I can’t guarantee anything,” Trump said. “I can’t guarantee tomorrow.”
He added that he doesn’t “believe” experts’ warnings about the risk of tariffs and instead insisted that they will “make us rich.”
