U.S. officials and reporters aboard Air Force One were ordered to discard all items received during President Donald Trump‘s two-day summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping before departing Beijing Friday.
Hard Security Call
Staff surrendered burner phones, credential badges and Chinese-issued lapel pins, dropping them into a bin at the plane's stairs, according to White House pool reporter Emily Goodin of the New York Post, who wrote on X, "Nothing from China allowed on the plane."
Photos and videos showed Trump, White House communications director Steven Cheung, Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) CEO Tim Cook, Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA) CEO Jensen Huang and Secret Service agents all wearing Chinese-issued lapel pins during the visit.
China remains a top U.S. cyber adversary with well-documented intelligence and espionage capabilities. Gifted items can be bugged and governments have done so in the past. Burner phones are standard protocol in high-risk foreign environments, as device compromise is often assumed from the moment of arrival.
