The second Trump administration’s shift toward rapprochement with China signals a strategic move for North American sports leagues like the NBA and NFL to prioritize market access and diplomatic accommodation over social activism.
The tone struck during US President Donald Trump’s recent visit to Beijing for meetings with Chinese leader Xi Jinping is being closely monitored by North American sports leaders. The global strategies of major sports leagues, including the NBA and NFL, will be shaped less by the talks between Trump and Xi on Taiwan, trade, and regional conflicts, and more by the lack of substantive discussion around human rights and democracy.
On the summit’s first day, President Trump highlighted cultural similarities between the United States and China. “The American and Chinese people share much in common,” including a love for basketball, he explained.
The game’s influence in China is undeniable. In 2022, basketball was cited as the country’s most popular sport. Introduced by YMCA missionaries to Tianjin in 1895 (just four years after the game’s invention in the US), it remained popular throughout seismic shifts in the country’s history, including the Chinese Civil War and the Cultural Revolution. Yao Ming’s stardom in the 2000s supercharged the NBA’s popularity in China. From 2004 to 2019, the league held 28 preseason games in cities including Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, and Guangdong. In 2019, broadcasts drew a viewership of 500 million before Chinese authorities took the league off the air.
That move came in response to a tweet from Daryl Morey, then general manager of the Houston Rockets, reading: “Fight for Freedom. Stand with Hong Kong.” The negative backlash from mainland audiences was swift, with sponsors dropping the Rockets, where Yao Ming spent his entire career. The NBA lost close to $400 million in broadcast revenue.
Since being deplatformed in 2019, the NBA has persistently sought to return to China. The league has rethought its social media strategy, maintained its country offices, and backchanneled through team executives close to the Chinese government. In 2025, following a six-year hiatus, relations began to mend, leading to exhibition games in Macau, a former Portuguese colony and current Special Administrative Region off the southern coast of China. As additional exhibition games are slated to take place in Macau later this fall, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver and league executives are hyper sensitive to any threats that could derail an eventual return to Mainland China.
Observers should expect the NBA and other major leagues with an interest in China, especially the NFL and its flag football initiatives, to follow the spirit of President Trump’s engagement with Xi Jinping. Though the first Trump administration was steadfast in its criticism of the Chinese government over issues such as democracy in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and the treatment of Uyghurs in Xinjiang, the second Trump administration now seems to favor rapprochement in order to resolve trade and market access issues
While President Trump promised to engage Chinese leader Xi Jinping on the imprisonment of Hong Kong media executive Jimmy Lai, a fierce critic of the Chinese Communist Party, doubts were raised earlier this week when he stated that Lai had “caused a lot of bedlam” for Xi. Though President Trump clarified that he would like to see Lai released, he added that the “request might be a hard one for me." On the second day of the summit, President Trump did in fact raise Lai, but was told by Xi that Lai’s case was a “tough one.” The tone was slightly more positive in the case of Jin Mingri (also known as Ezra Jin), a Christian pastor arrested last fall. President Trump told reporters that Xi said he would “strongly consider the pastor.”
The approach that the NBA takes to the Chinese market following the Trump-Xi summit will likely mark a shift from the previous decade plus of public relations and communications practices. In the recent past, the NBA has been considered an “activist” league. Athlete protest over social issues is more common on the hardwood than on the turf, the diamond, or the pitch. However, if the NBA’s rapprochement with the Chinese market mirrors that of the Trump administration’s with Xi, delicate negotiations over market access and an ethos of partnership will minimize activism in favor of accommodation.
