Sullivan seeks post-Biden stability in meeting with Xi in Beijing

National security adviser Jake Sullivan met with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing on Thursday, seeking to ensure that relations remain stable for whoever replaces President Biden in the White House come January.

“Being able to reach the end of President Biden’s administration with the relationship on a stable basis even though we have areas of difference and areas of difficulty, this is something we will work towards,” Sullivan said during a press conference in Beijing. 

Sullivan said reestablishing military-to-military communication channels between the U.S. and China was crucial for whichever administration is next in office.  

“We are going to look for a deepening of the military-to-military communication so that we can pass that on to President Biden’s successor and in fact a very positive outcome of the sessions here,” he said. 

Sullivan said the U.S. elections were not discussed in the meetings, but he reassured Chinese leaders that Vice President Harris shares Biden’s goal of “responsibly managing this competition so it doesn’t veer into conflict or confrontation.”

“Vice President Harris has been a central member of the Biden foreign policy team, a leading member and has been part of the design and execution of the overall strategy in the Indo-Pacific and with respect to the responsible management of US China relations,” he told reporters. 

Former President Trump has sought to cast Harris as weak on foreign policy, and he claimed she would be overwhelmed by world leaders like Xi, who she met with in 2022.

Sullivan met with the Chinese leader at the conclusion of a three-day trip and 14 hours of meetings in Beijing. He is leaving the country securing a commitment to schedule a call between the Chinese leader and Biden in the coming weeks. 

“President Xi asked National Security Advisor Sullivan to pass on his regards to President Biden,” the Chinese Foreign Ministry said in a readout of the meeting.

“President Xi expressed readiness to stay in touch with President Biden to guide and steer the development of China-U.S. relations.”

It was Sullivan’s first trip as national security adviser to the China, coming at the end of Biden’s only term in office. Sullivan said it is “logical and reasonable” that Biden and Xi will meet over the president’s final months in office, over potential crossing points at an economic summit to be held in Peru in November and the G20 in Brazil.  

Biden administration officials have described their strategy toward China as responsibility managing the relationship, to make sure competition does not veer into conflict. 

China’s threat to America’s economy and global security has been a rare area of bipartisan cooperation during Biden’s time in the White House, with the parties coming together to form a select committee on containing China, and advancing a bill banning TikTok, which is owned by a Chinese technology company.

Sullivan said he raised a number of thorny issues with Xi, including concerns over Chinese interference in the U.S. election, the security of Taiwan, naval confrontations in the South China Sea and China’s support for Russia’s war in Ukraine. 

“We’ll have to manage the risks and flash points too,” he said, “we’ll continue to work on all of those in the months ahead.”