Beijing Is Pushing Hard To Influence U.S. Views Of China, Report Says

President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping participate in a welcome ceremony at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China, in November of last year

Andrew Harnik / AP

Beijing is mounting an aggressive influence campaign targeting multiple levels of American society, according to a report published Thursday that is written by some of the top China experts in the U.S.

The working group that compiled the report includes scholars who for decades have agreed that as long as the U.S. continued to engage the People’s Republic of China, the paths of both countries would eventually converge and that when they did, China’s political system would become more transparent and its society more open.

However, as China’s economy climbed to unprecedented heights, President Xi Jinping has consolidated power, and in the eyes of the report’s authors, the idea of convergence has been put to rest.