Who is Chinese first lady Peng Liyuan?

When Chinese President Xi Jinping arrives in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 24, much of the attention will be on the high-stakes talks between the leaders that are expected to focus on trade, technology, artificial intelligence, and the complicated relationship between the world’s two largest economies.But at the summit, Xi will be joined by his wife, Peng Liyuan, who has spent more than a decade accompanying him on diplomatic trips and cultivating a public role that is unusual for a leader’s wife in China. A celebrated singer before Xi became China’s leader, Peng has helped transform the largely ceremonial role of the Chinese president’s wife into a more visible form of cultural and public diplomacy.Liyuan is Xi’s second wife and the mother of his only daughter. Before his marriage, Xi kept a low profile, leading to the running joke: “Who is Xi Jinping? He’s Peng Liyuan’s husband.” Peng, 63, was born in 1962 in the Shandong province to a family with artistic roots. Her mother was a Chinese opera performer, and Peng developed a career as a folk and soprano singer. She joined the People’s Liberation Army in the 1980s and eventually became one of China’s most recognizable performers. Liyuan and Xi married in the fall of 1987. Xi was working as the deputy mayor of the port city of Xiamen, Fujian. Even after their marriage, Liyuan was a regular performer on China Central Television’s annual Lunar New Year gala, one of the country’s most-watched television programs, and earned major honors for her work as a singer and actress. Chinese President Xi Jinping’s wife Peng Liyuan smiles as she poses for a photo with Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin during during an opening ceremony of the Belt and Road Forum in Beijing, China, on Tuesday, Oct. 17, 2023. (Sergey Savostyanov, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP) By the time Xi became general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party in 2012 and president in 2013, Peng was arguably the more recognizable half of the couple among the Chinese public.The title “first lady” is not a formal Chinese government position. But Peng has become the most publicly visible wife of a Chinese leader in decades.The history of the role in the People’s Republic of China is complicated.In the early years of Communist rule, leaders’ wives generally played little public diplomatic role. But in 1963, President Liu Shaoqi traveled to Indonesia and other Southeast Asian countries with his wife, Wang Guangmei, marking the first overseas trip by a Chinese leader accompanied by his wife. Other leaders’ wives were considerably more reserved. Zhuo Lin, the wife of Deng Xiaoping, accompanied him on foreign trips but generally avoided the spotlight. Jiang Zemin’s wife, Wang Yeping, maintained a low profile, as did Hu Jintao’s wife, Liu Yongqing.Mao Zedong’s third wife, Jiang Qing, was a dramatic exception. She became deeply involved in politics and was a member of the Politburo and a leading figure in the Cultural Revolution. After Mao’s death in 1976, she was arrested and eventually sentenced to life imprisonment.Peng’s public role represents something different: Rather than operating as a political power behind her husband, she has largely used her celebrity, cultural background, and international profile as tools of public diplomacy.Peng has frequently accompanied Xi on foreign trips after he became China’s leader, while taking on causes that fit the traditional public-facing role of a political spouse.In 2011, the World Health Organization appointed Peng a Goodwill Ambassador for tuberculosis and the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Before that appointment, she had worked in China on similar health initiatives. In 2014, UNESCO appointed her a Special Envoy for the Advancement of Girls’ and Women’s Education, citing her advocacy for education and women’s empowerment. Her background in the arts has remained part of her public identity as well. She has held senior positions within the PLA’s cultural institutions and has been associated with the People’s Liberation Army Art Academy.DEBATE AROUND AI REGULATION ‘MURKY’ AHEAD OF MIDTERM ELECTIONS: BYRON YORKPerhaps the clearest example of Peng’s new model of first-lady diplomacy came in 2014, when she hosted Michelle Obama during the former U.S. first lady’s first solo official visit to China. The visit was notable because it put Peng in a role familiar to Americans, where the first lady serves as a public diplomatic counterpart to another country’s first lady.Peng and first lady Melania Trump have had fewer public interactions than Peng did with Michelle Obama. The two most visible meetings between Peng and Melania Trump came during Xi’s 2017 visit to Mar-a-Lago and Trump’s trip to Beijing later that year, when the two women appeared together at several state events.