Donald Trump called former US president Jimmy Carter to discuss fear China is ‘getting way ahead’ of US
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Donald Trump told his predecessor Jimmy Carter that he was concerned about China becoming a superpower, the former US president has disclosed.
Trump made his first call as president to Carter from the West Wing in April, according to the White House.
On Sunday, Carter, who established formal diplomatic relations with China as president in 1979, told a Sunday school in his native Georgia about their conversation.
“The main thing that he emphasised to me was, the main purpose of his call, was to say very frankly to me on a private line that the Chinese were getting way ahead of the United States,” he said.
Carter said Trump had called him in response to a letter he had sent about relations with China, adding that he was “delighted” and “surprised” to receive the call.
The 94-year-old had marked the 40th anniversary of the re-establishment of diplomatic relations between Washington and Beijing with a warning of the risks of sliding into a “modern cold war”.