President Trump and a delegation of U.S. officials left Beijing on Friday after two days of high-level talks with the Chinese government, led by President Xi Jinping.
Before boarding Air Force One, White House staffers and reporters had to surrender various items collected during the trip, including staff burner phones, credential badges, and lapel pins issued by China. Those traveling on Air Force One threw those objects in a bin at the bottom of the plane’s stairs, according to a journalist in the White House press pool.
“Nothing from China allowed on the plane,” Emily Goodin, the White House correspondent for the New York Post, wrote in a post on X.
Photos from the trip show several people in the U.S. government delegation, including Trump, White House communications director Steven Cheung, Apple chief executive Tim Cook, Nvidia’s Jensen Huang, and Secret Service agents, all sporting pins on their coat lapels.
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Goodin did not explain why officials and reporters had to throw away those items, though presumably for security reasons. While the summit appeared cordial, China remains a key adversary of the United States, given its advanced intelligence and espionage capabilities. The U.S. and its allies have long accused China of spying and carrying out cyberattacks.
It’s not far-fetched to believe some of the gifted items could be bugged, as governments have done before. It’s also reasonable to assume the burner phones were likely targeted during the trip. Burner phones are designed to be new and dedicated devices that can be used where attacks can be assumed and later thrown out.
Spokespeople for the White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.