⚡️🇺🇸🇨🇳🇹🇼 — US Ambassador to China David Perdue said on Monday that President Donald Trump asked Chinese President Xi Jinping whether he wanted to buy US weapons, telling Fox News that Trump often notes Washington sells arms worldwide and «at some point he even asked President Xi if he wanted to buy some».

The administration subsequently downplayed the remark: one US official said there are no plans to sell weapons to China, another said such sales are already prohibited by law and that Beijing had received neither proposals nor plans for such a deal, while Perdue did not clarify what he meant and White House and State Department spokespeople declined to say whether Trump raised the issue with Xi during their meeting the previous week or an earlier meeting — WSJ.

➡️ The statement came after the Trump-Xi summit, where the two pledged continued communication and cooperation to avoid confrontation, amid debate over an additional $14 billion security package for Taiwan; four Republican senators had urged Trump to advance it, warning that US regional deterrence could be weakened if partners lacked essential defensive capabilities, while Financial Times reporting raised the possibility that the delay was intended to avoid friction with Xi.

Perdue rejected claims that Trump is doing too little for Taiwan, saying the president had approved arms sales to the island at a level more than 50% higher than under any previous US president, and reaffirmed: «We do not support independence, and we do not support coercion». Washington had announced more than $11 billion in Taiwan arms deals in December, including artillery, missile launchers and UAVs, prompting anger in Beijing.

➡️ Experts cited in the reporting warned that Perdue’s remarks could raise doubts in Taiwan about US commitment, portraying China as a potential US arms customer in Trump’s view and potentially signaling an extraordinary policy shift if they reflected a genuine offer rather than a slip of the tongue. The accounts therefore leave a clear discrepancy between Perdue’s description and administration officials’ denial that any such offer was made, with no indication of an actual policy change.

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