Laura Ingraham used to think Chinese President Xi Jinping was an “evil dictator” hell-bent on dominating America. One fancy White House dinner later, and she was positively swooning.
This was a “historic, dramatic, epic” experience, she said Friday on The Ingraham Angle. That was quite a different take from the last time Ingraham watched Xi sit down for dinner with a U.S. president.
“All of you already know how I feel about the CCP—its trade practices, human rights abuses, not to speak of the cover-up at the Wuhan lab. So imagine my surprise that I was invited,” Ingraham said, apparently recognizing that her presence at the dinner might seem a little incongruous.
It wasn’t the first time Ingraham had found herself reacting very differently to Xi depending on which president was sitting across the table. Xi’s San Francisco dinner with then-President Joe Biden three years ago drew a very different reaction from Ingraham.
She called it a “low point of American capitalism” for Biden to dine with the leader of a Chinese regime she deemed “endlessly belligerent” toward the U.S. and “viciously repressive.”
“China came out the winner,” Ingraham declared at the time. “Xi was playing three-dimensional chess.” Everyone else was a “pawn,” she added.
What a difference a conservative Republican president made for Ingraham.
Xi, however, still appeared to be playing “three-dimensional chess” with the fawning Trump and his media cronies.
The two world leaders reportedly “discussed” several issues, but the Trump administration had little to show for all the pomp and circumstance—except for two pandas gifted by China to the zoo in Atlanta.
But apparently none of that was enough to spoil Ingraham’s mood. At Thursday night’s state dinner, she appeared positively smitten with Xi, joining Trump and a parade of tech moguls as one of the roughly 100 guests.
“Hey, everybody, sorry I’m not on the show tonight,” Ingraham said in a video posted on Facebook on Thursday as she prepared to head to the event. “I had to stop by and see President Xi of China,” she preened in a black gown. “I’m invited to a state dinner; I have to go, of course… command performance. Looking forward to it.”
Ingraham wasn’t the only previously China-hating, anti-communist Fox News star who attended the dinner; Bret Baier and Jesse Watters were also there, taking a break from claiming Democrats are “communists” while giving China’s actual communists a big pass.
“Today’s Democratic Party is about overthrowing Trump. Tomorrow’s party is about overthrowing America,” Watters said on his show in June. “Once communists get a foothold in the party, it’s over. The base is going to grab that hammer and sickle and attack anyone and everyone in their path. There’s no negotiating with communism.”
Except, apparently, when Xi is the one at the table.
Xi landed at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland Wednesday night, and was greeted on a red carpet on the tarmac by Trump. It was the first time in 62 years that an American president has personally greeted a visiting world leader at a Washington airport. Visiting foreign heads of state are typically welcomed at the White House.
