Cook, Altman, Huang to attend Trump-Xi state dinner

Apple ↘ 0.26% Executive Chairman Tim Cook, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, and Nvidia ↗ 1.34% CEO Jensen Huang are set to attend President Donald Trump's state dinner for Chinese President Xi Jinping on September 24, bringing some of the most powerful figures in artificial intelligence to a high-stakes diplomatic gathering between the leaders of the world's two largest economies.

Bloomberg first reported on September 16 that Cook and Altman would attend the dinner, with OpenAI confirming Altman's attendance and a person familiar with the matter confirming Cook's presence. CNBC had earlier reported Huang's expected attendance. Politico reported that Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon also plans to attend.ndtvprofit+3

"President Trump has invited several great American business leaders to his dinner with President Xi because he will always prioritize making good deals for our country," a White House official said in a statement Wednesday.cnbc+1

AI Tensions Loom Over the Gathering

The dinner arrives at a fraught moment for both U.S.-China relations and the AI industry. Chinese open-weight models have advanced and narrowed the gap with American frontier labs, making artificial intelligence a likely focal point of the Trump-Xi discussions. Geopolitical friction over trade, the Middle East, and technology competition continues to strain ties between Washington and Beijing, though Trump said earlier this week that he maintains a "great relationship" with Xi.cnbc+1

Within the tech industry itself, a rift has opened over the pace of AI development. OpenAI told employees this week that the company was open to slowing development of cutting-edge AI, with Altman saying the company might align its tempo with a small number of peer labs. That position has drawn Altman closer to Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, who has called for curbing frontier model development, placing them on the opposite side of Trump and leaders like Huang and Meta Platforms ↘ 2.43% CEO Mark Zuckerberg.qz+1

A New Role for Cook, and a Wider Guest List

Cook stepped down as Apple CEO on September 1 and transitioned to the role of executive chairman. He has said he intends to remain involved in government relations, including dealings with the White House and China — a priority given Apple's heavy dependence on the country as both a manufacturing base and consumer market.macdailynews+1

Administration officials have separately discussed the possibility of a sidelines meeting with technology executives during Xi's visit, though no such session has been finalized. U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is expected to meet this weekend with Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng to hold preliminary talks on AI safety and governance ahead of the summit.news.sbs+1

On the Chinese side, officials are still finalizing Xi's delegation. Bloomberg reported that senior officials are discussing whether to include BYD founder Wang Chuanfu — a potentially provocative choice, given that the U.S. imposes a 100 percent tariff on Chinese electric vehicles and placed BYD on the Department of Defense blacklist last June.news.sbs