US Executives Join Trump on China Trip for Trade and AI Talks

Prominent U.S. executives from Big Tech, Wall Street, agriculture, aerospace, and other sectors will join President Donald Trump on his trip to China this week, according to a White House official. Trump is expected to arrive in Beijing Wednesday to meet with President Xi Jinping. In addition to discussions about Iran, the two leaders are expected to address trade and artificial intelligence.

Elon Musk

Musk, CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, previously led Trump's Department of Government Efficiency until leaving in spring 2025 before the agency was shuttered in November. The billionaire, who also owns the social media platform X, feuded with Trump last summer in a war of words that included Musk claiming without evidence that the government was concealing information about the president's association with Jeffrey Epstein. Musk later expressed regret over some of his posts. Since then, Musk has refocused on Tesla and his other companies. Tesla has operations in China, and Musk has visited there. He is also dealing with French prosecutors seeking charges against him and X over child sexual abuse images, deepfakes, disinformation, and complicity in denying crimes against humanity by the platform's AI system, Grok. There is also a trial pitting Musk against OpenAI CEO Sam Altman.

Tim Cook

Cook remains busy as his tenure at Apple winds down. He announced last month that his 15-year reign as CEO will end on Sept. 1, when he hands over duties to Apple's head of hardware engineering, John Ternus. During Cook's tenure, Apple's market value soared by more than $3.6 trillion. Cook will remain as executive chairman. Apple's reliance on overseas manufacturing required Cook to master political diplomacy, especially as Trump waged trade wars with China. After persuading Trump to exempt the iPhone from first-term tariffs, he faced a more daunting challenge during the current administration. While insisting that Apple shift iPhone manufacturing to the U.S., Trump imposed some tariffs, but Cook minimized fees by shifting production for the U.S. market to India and winning exemptions after promising $600 billion in U.S. investment.

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Jensen Huang

Nvidia CEO Huang heads to Beijing just months after the company received approval to sell one of its powerful AI chips to China, with conditions. In January, the Trump administration placed new security requirements on Nvidia's semiconductor sales to China but essentially greenlit the export of its H200 AI chips. Nvidia must ensure adequate supply in the U.S., and the H200 chips must undergo third-party review before export. The new rules lower the bar for exports, but China cannot use the chips for military purposes or import more than 50% of the chips sold to U.S. customers. The H200 is not Nvidia's most advanced product; the Blackwell and upcoming Rubin chips were not approved for export.

Kelly Ortberg

Robert “Kelly” Ortberg, former CEO of Rockwell Collins, became CEO of Boeing in 2024. He has focused on Boeing's recovery amid legal, regulatory, and production problems. A year ago, Ortberg said he didn't expect the U.S. trade war with China to forestall Boeing's financial recovery or prevent it from reaching aircraft delivery targets with Chinese airlines that were refusing to accept its planes. Beijing increased its import tax on American goods to 125% in April 2025 in retaliation for Trump raising tariffs on Chinese products to 145%. China's tariff would more than double the cost of passenger jets, but Beijing is less of a threat to Boeing now as it sends fewer finished planes there. Boeing has been in ongoing talks with China over a possible large aircraft sale.