← Videos · Foreign Policy & Defense

Trump Participates in a Bilateral Meeting with the Prime Minister of Japan, Sep. 22, 2026

September 22, 2026 · The White House · 0:04:45

Embedded from the source channel — never re-uploaded. Watch on YouTube

What happened

President Donald Trump held a bilateral meeting with the prime minister of Japan at the United Nations in New York on September 22, 2026, in a brief session carried on the White House channel. The President called it an honor to sit with her and said she would go down as one of Japan’s great prime ministers.

Speaking through interpretation, the prime minister thanked the President for his strong commitment to the U.S.-Japan alliance and said holding the summit at UN headquarters, in a difficult Asian security environment, showed the alliance’s strength to the world. She noted she had reshuffled her cabinet the previous week — 10 of 18 ministers changed — but assured the President that every counterpart of his team had been retained, naming the foreign, finance, trade, and defense ministers. She said economic-security cooperation between the two countries, including on AI, semiconductors, and critical minerals, was advancing under the two leaders, and proposed they get down to the many topics they had to discuss.

Why it matters

Japan is the anchor U.S. ally in Asia in Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s portfolio, and a counterpart-retention pledge from a newly reshuffled cabinet is a continuity signal for every negotiation running between the two governments — trade, defense, and the technology and critical-minerals cooperation named here.

Sources: The White House, “President Trump Participates in a Bilateral Meeting with the Prime Minister of Japan” (official upload, embedded above; the upload’s description places the meeting in New York, NY). The prime minister’s remarks as rendered by interpretation in the broadcast.