Biden plays down dictator remark after China reprimands US ambassador

China slams US President’s description of their leader as ‘absurd, irresponsible’ and lodges official complaint, as Biden insists relations remain unchanged.

President Joe Biden Biden’s seemingly offhand remark about Xi Jinping at a fundraiser near San Francisco on Tuesday evening appeared to push the boundaries of how a US leader refers to his Chinese counterpart. Picture: Reuters

President Biden said Thursday he didn’t believe his description this week of Chinese leader Xi Jinping as a dictator had set back US relations with China, after Beijing summoned the US ambassador for an official reprimand following the president’s comments.

“I expect to be meeting with President Xi sometime in the future, the near term, and I don’t think it’s had any consequence,” Biden said during a news conference alongside Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

China has vehemently objected to the president’s description of their leader as “extremely absurd and extremely irresponsible,” and Beijing lodged its official complaint, known as a démarche, with Ambassador Nicholas Burns, according to US officials.

Biden made the comments at a political fundraiser, saying that Xi was unaware that a Chinese spy balloon was flying over the US earlier this year and describing Xi as a dictator.

US ambassador Nicholas Burns received an official diplomatic note, known as a démarche, from China. Picture: Reuters

The Chinese Embassy in Washington declined to comment on the démarche, which took place hours after Secretary of State Antony Blinken departed from Beijing, where he held high-stakes meetings aimed at slowing escalating tensions between the world’s two largest economies. The State Department also declined to comment.

Démarches are used when one country wants to lodge a complaint or express an official position, and often takes place after an incident. Washington démarched a senior Chinese diplomat from the embassy following the discovery of the Chinese spy balloon.

Biden’s seemingly offhand remark at a fundraiser near San Francisco on Tuesday evening appeared to push the boundaries of how a US leader refers to his Chinese counterpart. While Xi is unelected and wields vast power, political analysts said the term dictator is loaded and rarely used by US presidents to describe leaders they hope to engage in diplomacy.

China’s Foreign Ministry termed Biden’s characterisation “extremely absurd and extremely irresponsible.” The US officials noted that Chinese state media hasn’t publicised the démarche, partially in the hope of seizing on momentum from Blinken’s trip, and partially to avoid drawing attention to the US president’s characterisation of Xi as a dictator.

China’s newly installed ambassador to the US, Xie Feng, “made serious representations and strong protests to senior officials” at the White House and State Department on Wednesday, according to an embassy statement emailed to some media early Thursday.

The two-paragraph statement also quoted an embassy spokesman saying Biden’s statements were a “smear of China’s top leader.” Chinese authorities haven’t published their statements on government websites and the matter has been ignored by state-run media and the nation’s social media channels, indicating domestic censorship of Biden’s remarks and Beijing’s response.

Burns, a career diplomat, was confirmed by the Senate to serve as ambassador to China in December 2021. He took the position as tensions continued to grow between the two countries on a range of issues from unfair trade practices to the future of Taiwan.

--James T. Areddy contributed to this article.

Write to Sabrina Siddiqui at [e-mail] and Vivian Salama at [e-mail]

Wall Street Journal