particularly over taiwan. you saw this bubble up last week with the taiwanese president that the u.s. has forces on ground, a training role, but in taiwan. that s a deep issue for china and it shows the depth of u.s. concern about china s threat to taiwan. so, to miss an opportunity for xi and biden to speak, perhaps find a way forward on this is a loss. the white house trying to look at this as a positive, because biden has something of an advantage. i take it, kaitlan, president biden was pretty pleased with his 90-minute meeting with pope francis yesterday. it was a very emotional opportunity for the second catholic president of the united states to meet with the pontiff. and he was rather blunt in describing his meeting with president emmanuel macron of france, saying basically the u.s. screwed up in the leadup for the rift that developed? i think french officials were surprised by just how candid the president was during that session yesterday, especially in front of cameras w
nuclear program might be the more likely yutoutcome from thi. did the control, kaitlan, undermine the president s ability to deal on a sensitive issue with iran with allies? what s so interesting talks with leaders last night they didn t think afghanistan came up during that meeting which is fascinating to me because it has raised a lot of concerns between the european allies, especially they had no choice but to follow suit with the american withdrawal. they thought it happened quickly, of course, it was chaotic and deadly and nobody was happy with how that went down so it raises questions about other policies and american troops in other places what does that mean. i think it was notable in the language of the joint statement that came out with the president talking about supporting the european defense separate from nato, of course that is something of concern to them. it seemed to be concession to i
met. we re standing by momentarily, kaitlan, what s called the g20 family photo, all of the leaders will gather for that. if. yeah, one of the things coming out of the meet and greets, saying that putin and china are not here. how the u.s. will take advantage of that, one concrete that we know thing they re expecting to endorse the global minimum tax which officials describe as a way to prevent the race to the bottom among with corporations where maybe they do their business in the united states but they go and set up in other countries that have more favorable taxes. and the country that endorses 80% of the gdp formally coming outside of the g20 summit, signing off on that. but there are provisions interesting, wolf, one is part of this where not to say global minimum tax, but they want to tax companies that are doing business in certain nations even if they have no physical presence there. of course, that is something a lot of business leaders have pushed back on.
this group together in person for the first time since 2019 because of the pandemic. yep. and obviously, a lot of them have chosen to handle the pandemic differently than others. these health care professionals and these other first responders, jim, they are the heroes of what we ve seen happening over the past year and a half, almost two years. they are. they saved lives. and they risk their own lives in doing so. they were on the front lines of this, even before vaccines, of course. and exposed to the sick. and many of them paid for it with their own health. so this san important acknowledgement of their service and their dedication throughout. and don t forget, after this wraps up, tomorrow, kaitlan, so many of these world leaders are heading to scotland for the climate summit, what s called the cop26 climate summit, they re going to spend a couple days there, as well, dealing with so many of them see as an existential threat to the globe. and what we re watching for whe
major issues, kaitlan collins, our chief white house correspondent is with us here in rome watching this unfold. ind kaitlan, set the scene, what are we expecting to see from the president. today is the kickoff of the g20 summit. it s the first time they ve met in person since 2019, obviously disrupted by the coronavirus pandemic and that is the pain topic sitting down today. the first session that president biden has with world leaders is focused on energy supply and the crisis happening there and the global minimum tax. that is something maybe really one of the concrete takeaways that the white house is talking about, wolf, when it comes to what they re seeing on the outcome of this summit. that is something that they want to prevent the race to the bottom with nations of the world. that is the measure that the president is taking and he s going to be tested from what he said a few months ago at the g7 summit.