Deseret News archives: ‘Ping-pong diplomacy' took center stage in 1971
On April 10, 1971, the U.S. table tennis team arrived in China at the invitation of the communist government for a goodwill visit that came to be known as 'ping-pong diplomacy.'
That year, nine players from the U.S. Table Tennis team took a historic trip to China, becoming the first delegation of Americans to visit the country in decades. Following the 1949 Chinese revolution, there had been no diplomatic ties, limited trade and few contacts between the United States and China.
Their trip was the start of what became known as 'ping-pong diplomacy' and helped lay the groundwork for establishing official diplomatic relations between the United States and China. Ping-pong diplomacy also led to improved people-to-people understanding and cultural exchange.
According to historical accounts, the U.S. team was at the 1971 World Table Tennis Championship in Nagoya, Japan, when an encounter between Glenn Cowan of the U.S. team and Zhuang Zedong of the Chinese team became an international sensation. Cowan had missed his bus following practice and boarded the Chinese team's bus. Zhuang approached the American, shaking his hand and offering him a depiction of the Huangshan Mountains on a piece of silk cloth.
When they exited the bus, journalists snapped photos of the two together. Two days later, the U.S. team received an official invitation to travel to China and play exhibition matches against the Chinese team. The United States accepted the invitation and everyone rushed to make arrangements.
U.S. Department of State consular officials in Japan, in advance of the team's onward journey to China, made a simple but profound change to their passports. On the page warning travelers of legal penalties 'for travel to or in Communist-controlled portions' of the listed countries, the officials simply took a black marker and carefully crossed-out 'China.'
The headlines in the Deseret News in in mid-April followed the daily interactions with the American athletes.
'Tennis players in Red China'
'Small hope opens in Red China Wall'
'Table tennis team will talk with China'
In 1972, U.S. President Richard Nixon made a trip to China. Here are some stories from Deseret News archives about the trip and diplomacy with China:
'Was Mao monster or Chinese hero?'
'Mao mementos a click away'
'Nixon's visit to China 20 years ago changed history'
'Soccer may help smooth ties between U.S., China'
'Qatar outreach widens with ping pong 'diplomacy''
'Deseret News archives: Nixon's trip to China concluded with a promise and a couple of pandas'
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The Hill
22 minutes ago
- The Hill
Trump's new model to support Ukraine is a win-win
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Fox News
32 minutes ago
- Fox News
DOJ forms Russiagate 'strike force' to investigate declassified Obama-era evidence
Print Close By Brooke Singman Published July 24, 2025 The Justice Department has formed a "strike force" to assess the evidence publicized by Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard relating to former President Obama and his top national security and intelligence officials' involvement in the origins of the Trump-Russia collusion narrative. The DOJ, on Wednesday evening, announced the formation of the "strike force," to investigate potential next legal steps which may stem from Gabbard's recent declassification of records suggesting that Obama administration officials "manufactured" intelligence to form the narrative that then-candidate Donald Trump was colluding with Russia to influence the 2016 presidential election. Justice Department officials told Fox News Digital that the DOJ takes the alleged weaponization of the intelligence community with "the utmost seriousness." 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Politico
42 minutes ago
- Politico
Jay Powell's new normal
Presented by Editor's note: Morning Money is a free version of POLITICO Pro Financial Services morning newsletter, which is delivered to our subscribers each morning at 5:15 a.m. The POLITICO Pro platform combines the news you need with tools you can use to take action on the day's biggest stories. Act on the news with POLITICO Pro. Quick Fix President Donald Trump's pressure campaign on Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell will intensify on Thursday, with a scheduled visit by him and other administration officials to the central bank headquarters as part of a probe into the ballooning price tag of its renovation. Expect to see it all over social media. The 4 p.m. inspection of the Fed's upgrades to two buildings will be yet another opportunity for officials to hammer Powell — those making the visit along with the president include White House officials James Blair and Russ Vought — and comes less than a week before the Fed's next interest rate decision. Trump has been hectoring Powell to slash borrowing costs – or perhaps just resign altogether, though the Fed chair has shown no sign of entertaining that possibility. There's also no sign that the administration and its allies are letting up. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has benignly compared Trump's broadsides against Powell to legendary college basketball coach Bobby Knight's strategy of 'working the refs' in an attempt to secure lower rates more quickly. A White House official told POLITICO last week that their goal in highlighting the costly renovations was, in part, 'to damage this guy's image.' Plenty of Trump allies are joining in on both counts. Take Tuesday, which represented what has increasingly become a normal day for Powell. At 8:42 a.m., Trump's top housing regulator, Bill Pulte, wrote on X: 'Jerome Powell should RESIGN,' one of many anti-Powell messages he posted that day. (Pulte is also among those scheduled to visit Fed HQ). A few hours later, Trump suggested in the Oval Office that he wouldn't try to fire Powell but also said: 'I think he's done a bad job, but he's going to be out pretty soon anyway,' calling him a 'numbskull' — one of his go-to insults for the central bank leader. A bit after 2 p.m. Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) posted a (fake) resignation letter from the Fed chief with the caption, 'Powell's out!' bookended by siren emojis. (Lee later deleted the tweet, telling a group of reporters that he'd done so 'out of an abundance of caution,' saying he hadn't checked if it was legitimate.) At 3:04 p.m., Sen. Cynthia Lummis posted: 'It's time for new leadership at the Fed. We need a Chair who has the trust of ALL Americans.' During all of that, Powell was at the Fed's headquarters (at a building not under construction) participating in a conference about bank regulation. Powell certainly isn't the first Fed chair to face a backlash. A Bloomberg column out Wednesday bore the headline: 'Fed Legend Paul Volcker Would Shrug Over This Attack,' pointing to presidential pressure faced by the former Fed chair during his push to crush inflation through high interest rates. But the campaign by the administration to undermine Powell's reputation is particularly striking and persistent. 'Some of it is maybe to throw some interference at Powell,' Stephen Moore, a former economic adviser to Trump, told MM of the administration's crusade. 'Some of it is just legitimate complaints about the way the Fed operates.' 'President Trump can both call out the Fed for failing to do its job by its own stated objectives and ensure that taxpayer money is not wasted on things that do not benefit the American people,' White House spokesman Kush Desai said in a statement to MM. Notably, Powell and his fellow Fed officials are forecasting that the central bank will cut interest rates this year. It's just not likely they will do so next week, though Fed board member Christopher Waller, who is on the shortlist to be the next chair, is among those internally making the case that they should. Indeed, more economists have been arguing for lower borrowing costs, given growing weaknesses in the economy such as a slowdown in consumer spending, although inflation also creeped up in June. Unemployment remains low, but the job market is showing signs of strain. 'Interest rates are clearly above neutral and that is slowly pulling the economy down and that's sort of a slow-moving problem,' said Adam Ozimek, chief economist at the public policy research firm Economic Innovation Group. 'If we don't get interest rates back to neutral soon enough, the strength of interest rates alone could bring us into recession.' But, 'obviously, the Federal Reserve is holding off on rate cuts as a result of uncertainty from the tariffs,' he added. 'If we didn't have tariffs, the Fed would have cut by now.' Investors expect Powell to begin cutting in either September or October, according to CME's FedWatch tool, when economic weakness could become more evident. In the meantime, pressuring Powell is 'the rough equivalent of someone on an elevator hitting the button repeatedly hoping it will make the elevator go up or down faster,' said Neil Dutta, head of U.S. economic research at Renaissance Macro Research. It's Thursday — How do you think this Trump-Powell saga ends? Let me know: vguida@ And as always, you can direct your MM tips and pitches to Sam at ssutton@ MORNING MONEY: CAPITAL RISK — POLITICO's flagship financial newsletter has a new Friday edition built for the economic era we're living in: one shaped by political volatility, disruption and a wave of policy decisions with sector-wide consequences. Each week, Morning Money: Capital Risk brings sharp reporting and analysis on how political risk is moving markets and how investors are adapting. Want to know how health care regulation, tariffs, or court rulings could ripple through the economy? Start here. Driving the day New home sales data for June is out at 10 a.m. …. House Financial Services ranking member Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) speaks at a Brookings Institution event at 11:30 a.m. … The view from Congress on Powell — Republican lawmakers still don't seem overly eager to engage on the question of whether Trump could or should fire Powell, according to reporting from our Katherine Hapgood, with many of them deferring both to Trump and to Fed independence. —'I've disagreed with some of the things that Chairman Powell has done, but also I think he's done a pretty good job of helping navigate through some of our tough financial times,' Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-Ga.) said. But 'with the president and his staff looking at it, I would ultimately probably support a decision that he makes.' —'I'd support the president, whatever he decided,' Rep. Marlin Stutzman (R-Ind.) said. —'I don't think he's doing a terrible job,' said Rep. Young Kim (R-Calif.). 'I don't really support removal of chairs without any reasonable, significant, credible reasons why we need to remove them. So I would support him staying in the office.' Former Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross' take, as told to our Ari Hawkins: 'If he tried to fire Powell and Powell resisted, that would mean there would be litigation — and if there's litigation, it can be very hard to end it in less than a year. … It's a little unclear to me why he would take on the headache for no gain in time.' The plan for AI — The White House released an action plan for artificial intelligence Wednesday, a sweeping federal initiative designed to cement U.S. leadership in artificial intelligence through deregulation, infrastructure expansion and global tech diplomacy, our Mohar Chatterjee reports. The 28-page policy blueprint runs through more than 90 federal actions with the goal of implementing them within the next year. It went public as part of a relaunched ' website Wednesday. —The plan also urges the SEC and other federal regulators to establish artificial intelligence-focused regulatory sandboxes, in a bid to boost the fast-moving technology's adoption, our Declan Harty reports. Fintechs fight back — The Financial Technology Association, American Fintech Council, Chamber of Progress Crypto Council for Innovation, The Digital Chamber Financial Data and Technology Association have sent a letter to Trump asking him to direct his administration to push back on a lawsuit filed by banks to block a new open banking rule. The government must file a brief on the lawsuit by July 29. Banks 'are exploiting regulatory uncertainty to preserve their market position and block competition, undermining your agenda and denying Americans access to the future of finance. This risks the future of fintech, digital assets, and America's financial innovation and global leadership,' they wrote. 'You can right this wrong.' Art of the deal — The European Union is eyeing a Japan-style deal with the Donald Trump administration that sets a 15 percent U.S. baseline tariff — but is ready to retaliate if no agreement can be reached by Aug. 1 deadline, our Koen Verhelst, Antonia Zimmermann and Nette Nöstlinger report. Wall Street Lawmakers probe big banks over IPO of Chinese firm — A congressional committee focused on the national security threat posed by China is demanding documents from JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America related to their roles in a Chinese battery giant's initial public offering, WSJ reports. On The Hill He's not running — Rep. Bill Huizenga (R-Mich.), a senior member of the House Financial Services Committee, will not run for Senate in Michigan next year, he said Wednesday, our Gregory Svirnovskiy reports. Huizenga did not explicitly commit to running for another term in the House, but his southwestern Michigan seat will likely be competitive in November either way. Nom nom nom — The Senate Banking Committee advanced Trump's nominee to chair the Export-Import Bank, along with a slate of other economic policy nominees at HUD and Commerce, our Jasper Goodman reports. First in MM: Cortez Masto introduced bill to restore CFPB funding – Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.) and 14 of her colleagues introduced a bill to restore the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's funding levels to 12 percent of the Federal Reserve's operating budget and reward whistleblowers with financial compensation. Among the co-sponsors is Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, Katherine reports. 'Slashing the CFPB's funding is a short-sighted decision that will have long-lasting effects on working families and our financial markets,' Cortez Masto said. 'It's important that we not only restore this funding but also give them more tools to keep us safe from scams.' Jobs report The Crypto Council for Innovation has named Ji Kim as its new CEO. Kim has been leading CCI as acting CEO since January. — Declan Megan Smith Thorpe is joining the Digital Chamber, a crypto trade group, as communications director. She is an alum of Kraken and former North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper's office. — Jasper
