Biden says he and Xi will open direct hotline of communication after San Francisco meeting

President Joe Biden said Wednesday that he and Chinese President Xi Jinping would maintain direct contact in the coming months.

Biden and Xi met for more than four hours Wednesday in San Francisco on the fringes of the 2023 APEC summit. The two leaders announced a preliminary agreement to disrupt the flow of fentanyl precursors to the United States and reopen military-to-military communications.

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China had broken off talks with the Pentagon following former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-CA) trip to Taiwan in 2022.

Despite worsening tensions between the two nations, Biden headed into Wednesday’s meeting by seeking to strengthen the U.S.-China relationship.

He additionally told reporters that he will continue to press Xi on human rights issues and that “being blunt with one another, so there’s no misunderstanding” is “critical” for advancing diplomacy.

“In the months ahead, we’re going to continue to preserve and pursue high-level diplomacy with the PRC in both directions, to keep the lines of communication open, including between President Xi and me,” the president told reporters at a press conference following Wednesday’s meeting. “He and I agreed that each one has to pick up the phone call directly and will be heard immediately.”

Biden and Xi’s relationship stems back to when both men served as vice president of their respective countries, and the president expressed some optimism that he could “trust” his counterpart.

“Do I trust? Trust but verify, as the old saying goes,” he said of Xi. “That’s where I am, and you know we’re in a competitive relationship, China in the United States, but my responsibility is to make this rational and manageable so it doesn’t result in conflict. That’s what I’m all about. That’s what this is about. To find a place where we can come together and where we find mutual interest that, most importantly from my perspective, that are in the interests of the American people. That’s what this is about. And that’s exactly what we’ll do.”

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You can watch Biden’s remarks in full below.