'Face the Nation' Moderator Margaret Brennan Talks About Her Visit To Beijing, What's Misunderstood In Rising U.S.-China Tensions And The Potential Fallout From A Ban Of TikTok

Margaret Brennan recently was among a small number of reporters who traveled with Secretary of State Antony Blinken to China, a trip designed to turn down the temperature on simmering tensions with Beijing. The network does have a cameraman who has been living in China for decades but, reflecting the tension between the two countries, the Beijing government has been otherwise limiting access. With 2024 presidential candidates expected to make China a central feature of their campaign rhetoric, Brennan said that the complexities of the relationship can get lost. Brennan has been moderating Face the Nation for the past five years, and she soon will have a new broadcast rival: Kristen Welker, who is taking the helm of NBC News' Meet the Press in the fall. In a recent interview with Deadline, Brennan talked about the China tensions, the concerns about press freedoms in foreign reporting, and about changes in the Sunday morning landscape. What concerns her is that there is too much rhetoric in the United States, particularly among lawmakers in her view, in referring to China as an adversary, and justifying U.S. actions like investments in our own technology sectors as being a counter to China, versus just good policy that we should be pursuing anyway. American policymakers what's happening in the inner circle in China.