Donald Trump gave Xi Jinping a statue of a bald eagle during a state dinner at the White House and later made him laugh with a joke about a fountain pen. The meeting in the East Room brought together American and Chinese representatives, as well as some of the most influential heads of technology and financial companies.
Trump proposed a toast to the relationship between the American and Chinese people and to a future based on peace, security and prosperity. In his speech, he emphasized that the two countries have different political systems, but the interests of their citizens require maintaining stable relations.
The gift for Xi is a statue measuring approximately three feet tall, made by an American artist in collaboration with Donald and Melania Trump. The bald eagle is a national symbol of the United States. Trump said he hoped the sculpture would find a "nice place" in Beijing.
Musk and Cook among guests
The dinner was attended by Elon Musk and Tim Cook, along with other technology executives. Also on the list were Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, Meta's Mark Zuckerberg, and executives from Google, Citigroup and other companies.
The South China Morning Post reported that JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon and Lockheed Martin CEO James Takelet were among the guests at the reception. According to the publication, representatives of investment, pharmaceutical and media companies were also present.
The fountain pen joke
During the tour of the White House, Trump showed Xi a photo of an automatic document signing device placed in place of the portrait of former President Joe Biden. In the video recording of the visit, Trump says: “And this is a fountain pen“, after which the Chinese leader laughs.
Trump has long used the fountain pen topic to question the way documents have been signed during the Biden presidency. The image was placed in the West Wing of the White House instead of the portrait of the 46th US president.
The dinner was held in the East Room, as the new White House Ballroom is still under construction. Trump is pitching it as a project that should rival the grand hall in the Chinese leadership complex, where he himself was hosted by Xi during his visit to Beijing in May.
Xi Jinping's state visit to the United States began on September 23 and ends on September 25. Before dinner, the two leaders held talks on trade, artificial intelligence, security and relations between Washington and Beijing.
Sources: Washington Examiner, South China Morning Post