Mixed Messages Undermine US-China Rebuilding of People to People Exchange

For the past few months, it has looked as though there may be something of a spring thaw in the U.S.-China relationship. Chinese diplomats have been lauding the so-called “San Francisco Vision”—referencing the meeting last November between Presidents Biden and Xi, which was meant to set guardrails on strategic competition and rebuild ties at the highest level. Xi Jinping himself called for 50,000 American students to come to China in the next five years, sending China’s educational bureaucracy into a frenzy. He met personally with high-level American business executives, first in San Francisco and then in Beijing months later.