Bessent and He to hold AI, trade, critical minerals talks Sunday

September 20, 2026 at 12:24 PM2 min

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U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng are set to meet Sunday at JP Morgan Chase's Manhattan headquarters to prepare potential agreements on AI, tariffs, and critical minerals. U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer will join the talks, which are due to start at 10:30 a.m. (1430 GMT). The meeting precedes a Washington summit this week between President Donald Trump and President Xi Jinping.

Key Facts

The talks are scheduled to begin at 10:30 a.m. (1430 GMT) on Sunday at JP Morgan Chase's headquarters in Manhattan.
U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer will join Bessent and He in the meetings.
The U.S.-China trade truce is set to expire on November 10.
China pledged to increase purchases of U.S. agricultural goods by $17 billion a year and to purchase more than 200 Boeing aircraft.
The November 2025 truce reached in Busan capped U.S. tariffs on Chinese goods at about 20%.

Agenda and Participants

The meetings at JP Morgan Chase's headquarters in Manhattan are due to start at about 10:30 a.m. (1430 GMT) and are expected to run all day. U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer will also participate in the talks. Key topics include the status of the U.S.-China trade truce expiring November 10, flows of Chinese rare-earth magnets and critical minerals, and potential guard rails for artificial intelligence. The discussions follow reports of key security breaches involving AI models.

Context and Prior Agreements

Many issues are holdovers from the Trump-Xi meeting in Beijing in May, including efforts to cut tariffs on non-strategic goods. China pledged to increase purchases of U.S. agricultural goods by $17 billion a year and to purchase more than 200 Boeing aircraft. The Bessent-He-Greer meeting follows a pattern set over the past 16 months, with officials meeting in European and Asian cities to prepare potential agreements. The November 2025 truce reached in Busan, South Korea, capped U.S. tariffs on Chinese goods at about 20% after tit-for-tat escalation had brought them to triple-digit levels.

Tariff and Trade Measures

The U.S. Supreme Court later struck down the Trump tariffs invoked under a national emergencies law, including duties related to fentanyl trafficking. Trump's administration has been rebuilding them under new authorities, including restoring a 12.5% tariff on Chinese goods over forced labor allegations. It is finalizing a separate tariff investigation aimed at curbing excess industrial capacity that it says is rampant in China. Under the truce, China promised to restore the flow of critical minerals to U.S. and global users.