Something historic happened in July. For the first time in Pew Research Center’s annual survey of world opinions towards the United States and China, China came out on top. For the past few years, China’s curve has been rising while America’s has been falling. The two lines finally crossed over this year.
Out of the thirty-six countries, covering all continents, Pew concluded that people in many countries now have more favorable views of China than the U.S. In countries such as Pakistan and Malaysia, the favorability for China was more than 50% higher than the U.S. In countries such as Italy and Spain, the spread was more than 20% favoring China. Even in countries such as the U.K. and France, America’s oldest allies, people favored China more than the U.S. by 5-10%. Canadians, our northern neighbor, favored China by 11%. With a new trade war breaking, their views of the U.S. will drop even more.
Pew also polled people in these countries about their confidence in President Trump and President Xi. Xi came out on top. The gap was even bigger in people’s confidence level in Xi vs in Trump. In South Africa, to which Trump offered asylum to a certain group of people, 20% more people had confidence in Xi. In Germany and Sweden 12% more people had confidence in Xi. Again, in our northern neighbor Canada, 15% more people favored Xi.
No one would object if President Trump takes the credit for this particular achievement.
We all remember how Trump used to brag that when he is in the White House, Americans would get tired of winning. Well, we won this!
We all know too well how Trump has made America lose in so many ways, from losing the trust and respect of our allies, friends, and trading partners to losing $37.5-$38 billion in military costs for his war in Iran. But let’s look at something else that directly reflects world opinion towards the U.S. or China: international visitors.
Besides his violent mass deportation operations of undocumented immigrants, Trump’s State Department also sharply reduced visas for legal immigration, according to a Washington Post report, including for students, workers, family members of citizens or legal residents, with nearly 200,000 fewer business and tourism visas issued in 2025 than a year earlier.
But it was not just reduced numbers. There are expanded social media history disclosures, strict background screening, diplomatic frictions, visa suspensions, travel bans covering 39 countries, and up to a $15,000 bond visitors from 50 countries are now required to post before being allowed in the U.S.
As a result, international travel to the U.S. declined by 5.5% last year, Reason magazine reported. Four million fewer foreign visitors came to the U.S. in 2025 than in 2024, according to a Travel Pirates report. As for Canadian visitors, government data showed a 25% decline in trips across the border into America in 2025. University of Toronto School of Cities found that Canadians made 42% fewer trips to the U.S. last year than they did in 2024. FIFA World Cup did pack crowds into stadiums in host cities, the overall international arrivals to the U.S. remained flat, another travel industry site reported.
As Reason put it, it is a combination of travel restrictions and anti-American sentiment has led to a decrease in international tourism during Trump’s second term.
On the other side of the Pacific, China did the opposite, which is encouraging international visitors any way possible. Ever since the end of the pandemic, China has carried out a series of visa relaxation policies for tourism, business travels, and family/friends visits. First, they rolled out the 24–240-hour visa-free transit. Then they signed mutual visa exemption agreements with 158 countries for 30-180-day visit. In early 2025, China further expanded its unilateral 30-day visa-free travel to China policy to 50 countries.
As a result, China’s immigration administration logged a 20.4% increase of inbound trips by foreign nationals in the first half of 2026, totaling 22.91 million visitors, with 17.82 million of them on visa-free entries. With the visa free policies, social media meme “Chinamaxxing,” convenient mobile payment systems, departure tax refund policy, and yes, widespread use of air-conditioning especially for European visitors, China has had a blockbuster summer of international tourism. One new trend that makes tourists to China more excited about is that they can now go beyond the conventional sightseeing of landmarks and historical sites to take immersive industrial or rural tours, watching robotic arms operate in an EV factory, for instance, or spending time with residents of ethnic villages.
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