Trump and Xi expected to discuss AI race at White House summit

Trump, Xi expected to discuss AI race at White House summit

President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Xinping are likely to discuss their nations' competing AI ambitions at their meeting next week.

Xi will be coming to Washington, D.C. and will be speaking with the president at the White House. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has already said he would be discussing AI-related topics with Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng this weekend ahead of the summit between Trump and Xi.

National security is also likely to be part of the discussion. Experts in both countries have urged their governments to prepare for scenarios in which an AI system interferes with a nuclear command-and-control network or launches a military cyber operation, leaving leaders with only minutes to determine whether the other side had initiated an attack, Reuters reported.

Another issue hanging over the meeting will be the U.S. government's accusation in September that six Chinese companies stole and copied American AI products using distillation, a technique that allows developers to train models by learning from the outputs of more advanced systems.

Beijing has denied this, but U.S. officials say this was likely done with "Chinese government awareness," according to Reuters.

The U.S. restricting chip exports to China, a practice that has been in place since 2022, has also been a point of contention between the two nations.

Late last year, Trump eased these restrictions, allowing the sale of Nvidia's H200 AI chips to Chinese firms. The H200 chips are the most powerful on the market.

Reuters contributed to this post.