US public sees China in more positive light

The 2025 Chicago Council Survey indicates that United States politicians who embrace disengaging from and limiting China are no longer in step with the views of a majority of the US public.

The survey was conducted by Craig Kafura, director of public opinion and US foreign policy at the nonpartisan, nonprofit Chicago Council on Global Affairs, with data collected from July 18 to 30.

Kafura found that positive feelings toward China among people in the US have grown 11 points on a scale of 100 since August 2024, and have rebounded to pre-pandemic levels.

More important, a majority of people in the US who were surveyed — 53 percent — said the country should undertake friendly cooperation and engagement with China, while 44 percent preferred a policy of actively limiting China's growth in power.

Based on the council's past surveys, this was the first time since 2019 that a majority of US respondents have preferred a policy of cooperation and engagement with China.

David Firestein, president and CEO of the George H.W. Bush Foundation for US-China Relations, said, "I think this poll indicates that we may be starting to see a shift, and possibly a significant shift, in American public sentiment toward China."

"Admittedly, this poll is an outlier relative to most of the polling that we have seen produced by American public opinion firms over the last several years. But it may be a harbinger of a change in sentiment toward China that is a function of the emerging realization on the part of the American people that America's current approach to China is simply not working well for our country or our people," Firestein added.

The survey also found that the US people are divided over the impact of US-China trade on US national security, with 48 percent saying it weakens national security and 47 percent saying the bilateral trade strengthens it. This was a shift from public opinion during the pandemic, when 58 percent of poll respondents believed it weakened US security.

In addition, about 54 percent of those polled oppose higher tariffs on Chinese imports, and 66 percent favor reducing tariffs on Chinese imports in exchange for China reducing its trade deficit with the US.

The survey also found a party divide: More Democrats and independents favor cooperation with China, while more Republicans favor limiting China's influence.

"This overall shift is driven primarily by improving views among Democrats and independents," Kafura, the director, said in his report.

Despite the partisan gap, the survey found that people in the US remain united in their top priority of avoiding conflict with China. A majority of those surveyed — 62 percent — prioritize avoiding a military conflict.

High degree of consistency

Firestein, the president and CEO, said that over the eight years preceding the current presidential term, there was a high degree of consistency in the US approach to China.

"President Biden's term of office was essentially tantamount to a second Trump term, as far as US-China policy, and especially economic and trade policy, was concerned," said Firestein. "The emphasis was on maintaining the tariffs and significantly increasing the level of restrictiveness around US-China economic, trade and investment engagement."

As a former diplomat who has worked at the US embassy in Beijing, Firestein has engaged with the US public across the country on China and the US-China relationship over the years.

"I have found, and said, for many years that the level of negativity the American people presumably or ostensibly feel toward China is not nearly as deep or as solid or as calcified as US political figures seem to believe that it is … and this poll seems to vindicate this assertion," he said.

Firestein said the survey indicates that people in the US believe, to a greater degree than they did before, "that the Trump/Biden tariffs are actually a US federal tax, and a heavy one, on the American people, first on importers and ultimately on consumers, that it's inflationary, job-killing and, on top of everything else, highly regressive and unfair".

To Firestein, this poll is an important data point suggesting that people in the US feel that the country has miscalibrated its policy toward China since US President Donald Trump's first term and needs to make a course correction.

"I think the American people understand that our nation's relationship with China, while certainly having a major competitive element to it, is nonetheless of vital importance to the future of our country," he said. "We have to do a better job formulating and implementing policies that actually achieve our own stated objectives and advance our nation's interests. That is not the situation that the American people are seeing now, and this poll reflects that.

"Ultimately, the people of this country want, and are best served by, a US-China relationship that is functional, constructive, results-oriented, mutually beneficial and politically sustainable," he added.