Free Republic

When Xi Jinping rolled out the red carpet for Gavin Newsom inside the Great Hall of the People in October 2023, the staging told you everything you needed to know about who the meeting was actually for. The general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party does not summon backbench governors for ceremonial handshakes. He receives heads of state. And the American official sitting across from him that day was not a head of state. He was the governor of one state in a federal union, traveling on what his own office called a “subnational” diplomatic mission to a hostile foreign...

Gavin Newsom was granted a surprise audience with China's leader Xi Jinping when he visited Beijing on Wednesday after being warmly welcomed by other senior leaders of the Chinese Communist Party. Newsom, the Democratic California governor, said his meeting with Xi had been 'remarkably positive'. The 45-minute meeting took place in the palatial Great Hall of the People. U.S. media were physically blocked from Newsom's meeting with Xi, while Chinese journalists were allowed in, the San Francisco Chronicle reported Biden and Xi are expected to meet at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in San Francisco in November