Fox News host Jesse Watters described a lively White House state dinner with President Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping, complete with a handshake and a personal Trump introduction that drew a nod from Xi.
Watters appeared on Fox News’s top-rated “The Five” the day after the dinner and walked viewers through the night. He said he attended the Thursday evening state dinner honoring Xi at the White House and left with a story that mixed protocol, personalities, and a classic Trump line.
According to Watters, the guest list mixed Fox colleagues, Cabinet officials, and major tech executives. He named Laura Ingraham and Bret Baier among the Fox personalities present, along with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg, and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang.
Watters said he mingled through the evening and got his moment with Xi near the end. Mediaite reported his on-air account of the exchange in full.
Watters told the panel:
"But Xi, when he came up I got a chance to shake his hand at the end. ‘Thank you, nice to meet you’ and President Trump was right there, he goes, ‘Xi, [pointing at Watters], great, great man! Not as great as me!’ Xi Jinping is like [nodding]. But it was a real fun time."
The line fit the president’s style, warm to the guest, competitive in the same breath, and delivered in front of the Chinese leader. Watters framed the night as enjoyable and straightforward. When a co-host openly wondered whether the story was actually “true,” Watters shot back that he had only been asked how the dinner went.
“You asked me how the dinner was!” he said.
The dinner chat stood in contrast to the harder edge Watters has used on his own program when the subject turns to left-wing politics at home. In June, while discussing the rise of democratic socialist candidates in New York, he told viewers, “It’s not socialism, guys. This is communism,” and added, “You can’t reason with these guys. You have to crush them.”
More recently, his primetime show ran a chyron warning that a “Commie wave hits New York City” during a segment that referenced Mayor Zohran Mamdani and other democratic socialist candidates. The same host who shook Xi’s hand at a formal state dinner has not softened his language about the ideological fight inside American cities.
That mix, access to the room where global power is hosted, paired with a blunt message for voters back home, is familiar Watters territory. Viewers have watched him spar on air over everything from regulation to personal branding, including when he pushed back on AI regulation talk and called himself “prudent” in a clash with a liberal co-host.
Watters’ guest list sketch put American business and national-security figures in the same room as the Chinese president. Zuckerberg and Huang represent two of the most powerful technology companies in the country. Hegseth, as defense secretary, sits at the center of U.S. military policy. Ingraham and Baier are longtime Fox voices. The seating alone signaled the administration’s preference for direct contact over distant process.
Trump’s decision to hold the state dinner and personally introduce a friendly media figure fit a governing style that rewards loyalty and keeps the spotlight close. Watters has built a brand on that proximity, from the launch era of “Jesse Watters Primetime” through regular turns on the network’s biggest panel show.
None of the dinner details Watters offered came with an official White House readout in the available account. Absolute calendar dates were not attached, only “Thursday night” for the meal and “Friday” for the on-air retelling. The co-host who questioned the story was not named, and no independent guest list appeared alongside Watters’ recollection.
Even so, the core sequence was plain: a state dinner for Xi, a Fox host in the room, a handshake, and a president who used the introduction to praise his guest while ranking himself first. Watters called it a real fun time and left it there.
Fox personalities remain a constant source of viewer argument and internal drama, whether the subject is an on-air claim or larger network moves. Audiences who follow those fights have also watched coverage of everything from viewer pushback over a Watters “assignment” claim to broader talent shifts across the channel.
For conservatives who want a president who can host a rival power without apology and still sound like himself, the anecdote lands clean. Trump did the diplomacy, kept the humor, and put an American host forward as a “great, great man”, with the inevitable caveat. Watters got the handshake, told the story, and went back to warning about communism in New York the next chance he got.
Leaders who can work a state dinner and still name the threat at home are doing the job voters hired them to do.
