U.S. and China plan September AI talks amid tech rivalry

Jul 21, 2026

The United States and China are planning high-stakes bilateral talks on artificial intelligence in September 2026, ahead of Chinese President Xi Jinping's visit to the U.S. led by U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, the discussions represent the first official AI dialogue under President Donald Trump. Both superpowers seek to regulate frontier AI models amid rising anxieties that these technologies could enhance military capabilities, enable cyberattacks and disrupt labor markets.

China's WAICO coalition

▪The World Artificial Intelligence Cooperation Organisation (WAICO) includes 29 nations, and China has committed to providing 5,000 AI training opportunities for developing countries over five years.
▪China launched the World Artificial Intelligence Cooperation Organisation (WAICO) in July 2026 at the World AI Conference in Shanghai.

September bilateral AI talks

▪The September 2026 AI talks stem from agreements made during the summit between Donald Trump and Xi Jinping in May 2026.
▪The planned September 2026 AI talks are expected to take place ahead of Chinese President Xi Jinping's planned visit to the United States on September 24, 2026.
▪The United States and China are planning to hold bilateral talks on artificial intelligence in September 2026.

Tech governance regulatory priorities

▪The Trump administration is in discussions with United States artificial intelligence companies to establish voluntary safety standards for releasing new models.
▪Chinese President Xi Jinping criticized the United States technological monopoly at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference, stating that artificial intelligence development should not be a solo performance by one country.
▪U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent projected that AI advancements could potentially double United States productivity, drawing a comparison to the internet boom of the 1990s.

Frontier AI model regulation

▪The News International reported that the Trump administration was considering banning or restricting Chinese advanced AI models, while noting that the report had not been officially confirmed.
▪The Trump administration pressured Anthropic to temporarily disable worldwide access to its Claude Fable 5 and Mythos 5 artificial intelligence models following a hacking incident linked to China.
▪The United States and China are seeking to address regulatory challenges and mitigate risks posed by increasingly powerful frontier AI models.

U.S. chip export restrictions

▪The United States has limited exports to China of some of the most advanced artificial intelligence chips.
▪The United States has held off on adding Chinese AI startup DeepSeek and memory chipmaker CXMT to a trade blacklist to avoid escalating tensions.
▪The Chinese Ministry of Commerce is mulling export controls and restrictions on foreign users downloading open-weight models to local servers.

AI technology theft allegations

▪United States Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent warned that the United States has the authority to impose sanctions if foreign artificial intelligence models are confirmed to have stolen technology from American companies.
▪United States Trade Representative Jamieson Greer previewed a government-wide investigation into China's artificial intelligence development practices, citing forced technology transfer and intellectual property theft.
▪United States Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent stated on July 21, 2026, that watermarks from United States large language models are being found in multiple Chinese artificial intelligence models.

Model distillation controversy

▪Anthropic accused Chinese artificial intelligence labs in February 2026 of using distillation, which involves training a less capable model on the outputs of a stronger model, to bypass export controls.
▪The Trump administration plans to investigate whether Chinese artificial intelligence models have been distilled from American models.

Chinese model access curbs

▪Chinese authorities are considering curbing overseas access to their most powerful AI models amid concerns over the hacking potential of Anthropic's Mythos.
▪The core of the AI discussions centers on restricting access to advanced AI models by non-state actors, a framework U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent outlined on May 14, 2026, in Beijing.
▪The launch of the Kimi K3 model by Chinese startup Moonshot has heightened competition and anxiety in Silicon Valley over open-source capabilities.
▪Beijing's priority list for the discussions includes Anthropic's Mythos, United States control over future frontier models, and potential restrictions on Chinese open-weight models.

Bessent delegation leadership

▪United States Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is slated to lead the American delegation for the September 2026 AI talks.
▪In May 2026, Scott Bessent stated that future talks would aim at halting the proliferation of powerful AI models to non-state actors.

Chinese AI market growth

▪Chinese open-weight models, such as Moonshot AI's Kimi K3 and Alibaba's Qwen 3.8 Max, are matching or surpassing leading United States models on certain industry benchmarks.
▪The share of tokens processed by Chinese artificial intelligence models on platforms used by United States enterprises reached a record high of 58% in July 2026.

Military AI capabilities concerns

▪Washington and Beijing are concerned that advanced AI models could strengthen military capabilities, enable cyberattacks on critical infrastructure, and disrupt labor markets.
▪The planned meetings would constitute the first official United States-China dialogue on artificial intelligence under President Donald Trump.