Palacio Duhau – Park Hyatt Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires, Argentina
5:47 P.M. AST
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Thank you very much. And it’s a great honor. This is a very important meeting. A lot of people are looking forward to it. I know that President Xi and myself are looking forward to it. And we’ve also established an incredible relationship.
I want to thank the President for his nice, best wishes to the Bush family on behalf of a man that we all respected and liked very much, President Bush. And we very much appreciate that, Mr. President.
We will be going back — I will be going back to Washington right after this dinner, and we’ll be spending three days of mourning and three days of celebrating a really great man’s life. So we look forward to doing that, and he certainly deserves it. He really does. He was a very special person.
I spoke with Jeb and George today, and we had great conversations. And we discussed, actually for quite some time, the father and how much they love him and how much that he loved them.
So we are now going to start our meeting. We’ll be talking about a number of topics. One topic that we’ll bring up will be the fentanyl problem that we have in the United States, which is a tremendous problem. I’ll be asking the President to do something about that; I think he’ll be able to. If he puts that on a restricted category, we’ll be able to pretty much stop it right there. That would be — to criminalize it in China would be a great thing.
We’ll be discussing trade. And I think at some point, we’re going to end up doing something which is great for China and great for the United States. And I look very much forward to the dinner. I look very much forward to the discussion and, I’m sure, discussions after.
But the relationship is very special, the relationship that I have with President Xi. And I think that is going to be a very primary reason why we’ll probably end up — ending up getting something that will be good for China and good for the United States.
So we very much appreciate it. Please.
PRESIDENT XI: (As interpreted.) Honorable President Trump, the Secretaries of the American side, while it is indeed a great pleasure to have this meeting with all of you in the city of Buenos Aires, (inaudible) this is a manifestation of our personal friendship.
It has been quite a while since our previous meeting. And over the past recent period, a lot of things have taken place in the world. China and the United States, two important countries with major influence in the world, showed the important responsibilities for international peace and prosperity.
Only with cooperation between us can we serve the interest of world peace and prosperity. And that is why I look forward to this meeting between the two sides, where we could have exchange of ideas or issues of mutual interest, and also, especially, to jointly map out a future for China-U.S. relationship.
I’m also greatly saddened by the passing away of the late President Bush, who is someone who made important contribution to China-U.S. friendship and relationship during his lifetime. And this morning, via the Chinese Foreign Ministry, I have sent a message of condolences to President Trump, and hopefully you will convey our condolences to the Bush family. Thank you.
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Well, thank you very much. That’s very nice, and I appreciate it.
I want to just add that Air Force One will be taking myself and a large group of our people back to Washington. It will then be reset and it will be sent to Houston to pick up the casket of President Bush and then be brought back to Washington.
So that will be done in pretty rapid order. Most of you know the process, the procedure. But we’ll be sending Air Force One, which is a special tribute that he deserves very much. And it’s my honor. And again, he’ll be missed. He’ll be greatly missed. He was a terrific person and terrific man.
Thank you all very much. Appreciate it. Thank you.
END
5:56 P.M. AST
