PinnedUpdated Nov. 18, 2025, 1:44 p.m. ETPresident Trump brushed aside a reporter’s question about the role Saudi Arabia’s crown prince, Mohammed bin Salam, played in the death and dismemberment of a Washington Post journalist in 2018, praising the kingdom’s de facto ruler in a joint Oval Office appearance that was heavy on flattery.Mr. Trump strongly defended Prince Mohammed, who U.S. intelligence has said ordered the killing of Jamal Khashoggi, the journalist who was killed by Saudi agents. Prince Mohammed has denied involvement.“A lot of people didn’t like that gentleman that you’re talking about, whether you like him or didn’t like him, things happen,” Mr. Trump said, referring to Mr. Khashoggi.Prince Mohammed said Saudi Arabia “did all the right steps” to investigate Mr. Khashoggi’s death. “It’s painful and it’s a huge mistake,” he said.The visit was a striking diplomatic turnabout for the crown prince, who had not been on U.S. soil since 2018, the same year that Mr. Khashoggi was killed at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. During the Biden administration, U.S. intelligence officials released a report determining that the crown prince had ordered the killing, but the White House declined to take direct action against him.When a reporter asked Prince Mohammed about that finding in the Oval Office on Tuesday, Mr. Trump interjected. “He knew nothing about it,” the president said. “You don’t have to embarrass our guest by asking something like that.”The prince arrived at the White House with some of his objectives already accomplished: Mr. Trump said on Monday that he intended to sell the kingdom F-35 fighters despite concerns raised by the Pentagon about the risks involved with selling the technology to an ally that has a security partnership with China.The arrival ceremony exceeded the typical pomp for a visiting foreign leader: A Marine band played as officers on horseback carried the Saudi and American flags, and advanced fighter jets flew over the White House in a V formation.Before the visit, a host of other U.S.-Saudi agreements were in process, including one on artificial intelligence, a mutual defense pact and an agreement that would eventually offer Saudi Arabia access to the United States’ nuclear technology.Here’s what else to know:Investment: Mr. Trump said the U.S. can “count on $600 billion” in Saudi investments in the United States, a figure that economists say is highly unrealistic as the kingdom faces mounting fiscal constraints because of subdued oil prices and Prince Mohammed’s high spending on megaprojects. Prince Mohammed said that Saudi Arabia “believes in the future of America” and would increase its pledge to almost $1 trillion — a number the size of Saudi Arabia’s entire sovereign wealth fund.Family business: Mr. Trump denied conflicts of interest stemming from his family’s business connections in Saudi Arabia, saying he had “nothing to do with the family business.” This week, the Trump Organization and its Saudi-based development partner, Dar Al Arkan, announced a new project allowing cryptocurrency investors to buy into Trump-branded real estate projects, and Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law, runs a private equity firm that has taken $2 billion from a fund led by the crown prince. “What my family does is fine,” he said. “They do business all over.”Military deals: Mr. Trump’s willingness to sell American-made military technology must first overcome production bottlenecks and get congressional approval. Mr. Trump is likely to encounter criticism from other allies, namely Israel, for his willingness to sell advanced U.S. military technology to the Saudis. There are also concerns that China could eventually gain access to it.Israel: Prince Mohammed said he wants Saudi Arabia to be part of the Abraham Accords and establish ties with Israel, but must be sure of “a clear path to a two-state solution” before that. Such a deal is unlikely anytime soon.Red-carpet welcome: Prince Mohammed was not receiving a state visit because he is not the head of state, a distinction that lies with his father, King Salman bin Abdulaziz. Still, the visit comes with all the trappings of one. Prince Mohammed will be treated to a black-tie dinner with business leaders and lawmakers later on Tuesday at the White House. On Wednesday, he will travel with Mr. Trump to a business investment conference in Washington.Nov. 18, 2025, 1:44 p.m. ETIsmaeel NaarReporting from Dubai, United Arab EmiratesPresident Trump in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, this year. Mr. Trump has continued to argue that a diplomatic breakthrough is within reach.Credit...Doug Mills/The New York TimesCrown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia’s visit to Washington this week unfolds under a familiar shadow: American hopes that Saudi Arabia will finally normalize relations with Israel.But the Saudi government’s position remains unchanged. Without a credible pathway to Palestinian statehood, the Saudi crown prince said normalization with Israel may still be far off.“We want to be part of the Abraham Accords but we also want to be sure that we secure a clear path of a two-state solution,” Prince Mohammed said on Tuesday at his Oval Office meeting with Mr. Trump, referring to the series of deals in which several Arab countries established diplomatic relations with Israel in 2020.“We want peace with the Israelis, we want peace with the Palestinians, we want them to coexist peacefully in the region,” he added.Both Prince Mohammed and Mr. Trump confirmed they had extensive talks about the normalization efforts before the visit this week. “I don’t want to use the word commitment, but we’ve had a very good talk with the Abraham Accords,” Mr. Trump said, while Prince Mohammed described the discussions on a two-state solution as “healthy.”“We’re going to work on that to be sure that we can prepare the right situation as soon as possible,” Prince Mohammed told reporters.Still, one major problem, both Saudi and American analysts say, is that there is almost no support in Israel’s current political climate for the compromises that would be required to obtain a deal with Saudi Arabia.As Israel and Hamas observe a fragile cease-fire in Gaza after more than two years of war, many Israeli officials have dismissed the possibility of ever allowing an independent Palestinian state — including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Mr. Netanyahu also faces pressure from far-right members of his government. Bezalel Smotrich, his finance minister, said at a conference last month that if the Saudis conditioned normalization on a Palestinian state, Israel should say, “No thanks, keep riding camels in the desert sands of Saudi Arabia.” He later apologized for how he phrased the remark, but reiterated that he would not accept what he called a Palestinian “terrorist state.”Hussein Ibish, a senior resident scholar at the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington, said: “You have to go quite far into the left wing of the Knesset to find Israelis who are willing to contemplate” Palestinian recognition.Over the past year, Saudi Arabia, along with France, has lobbied Western governments to recognize a Palestinian state, and several countries did so this year. Since the war in Gaza brought the Palestinian cause back to the center of Arab politics, Saudi leaders — who see themselves as guardians of the Muslim world and stewards of Islam’s holiest sites — view any normalization of relations with Israel absent a Palestinian state as a profound strategic misstep, analysts say.The real question, Mr. Ibish said, is whether the Trump administration can find a way to separate a Saudi-Israeli deal from another American objective: finalizing a U.S.-Saudi defense agreement, something that the Biden administration tried but failed to achieve. Signing such a defense pact is one of Prince Mohammed’s priorities during his visit.Nov. 18, 2025, 1:19 p.m. ETWhile Prince Mohammed and President Trump spoke in sweeping terms about Saudi investment in the United States, there’s a wide gap between the numbers they raised and what is possible in reality. Saudi Arabia is facing a cash crunch at home, with limited free financial capital to invest abroad. The new number the prince floated today, $1 trillion, is roughly the size of Saudi Arabia’s entire annual economic output.Nov. 18, 2025, 1:15 p.m. ETAs someone who has covered Prince Mohammed for a decade, I was struck by how comfortable and confident he seemed in the Oval Office during most of that appearance with President Trump — even while fielding critical questions from American reporters. It was clear that he felt he was among friends.Credit...Kenny Holston/The New York TimesNov. 18, 2025, 1:11 p.m. ETPrince Mohammed said he was “in discussion” about contributing Saudi money to reconstruction efforts in the Gaza Strip. “It will be a lot,” President Trump interjected, although the crown prince did not confirm that. Prince Mohammed is not keen to get involved in reconstructing or policing Gaza in a time when his financial capital is limited and he is largely focused on his domestic economic priorities.Nov. 18, 2025, 1:09 p.m. ETPresident Trump spends a lot of time denigrating the press, but the vitriol he is displaying in front of a diplomatic guest is stunning. He lashed out at a reporter’s question, calling her a “terrible person” and saying he believed ABC News’s broadcasting license should be revoked. The crown prince has fielded tough questions with calmer replies.Credit...Kenny Holston/The New York TimesNov. 18, 2025, 1:05 p.m. ETTrump spent some time trying to get Prince Mohammed to say that he has been the best president for the Saudi Arabia-U.S. relationship. The crown prince demurred, praising President Franklin Delano Roosevelt — “a Democrat” — and President Ronald Reagan. Trump then diverted and started talking about how he wouldn’t try to fist-bump the crown prince, like his predecessor, President Joseph R. Biden Jr., did in 2022.Nov. 18, 2025, 12:57 p.m. ETPresident Trump said he “can see” a deal happening to transfer American nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia, but did not specify a possible timeline. Saudi Arabia has been negotiating the terms of such a deal with successive American administrations for more than a decade.Nov. 18, 2025, 12:56 p.m. ETPresident Trump was asked about conflicts of interest arising from his family’s investments in Saudi Arabia. Trump said that he had “nothing to do with the family business.”“What my family does is fine. They do business all over,” he said. “They’ve done very little with Saudi Arabia actually, I’m sure they could do a lot.”Nov. 18, 2025, 1:01 p.m. ETSince Trump’s election a year ago, Dar Global, a business partner of the Trump Organization that has close ties to the Saudi government, has announced at least four Trump-branded developments in Saudi Arabia. The Trump Organization is also in negotiations that could bring a Trump-branded property to one of Saudi Arabia’s largest government-owned real estate developments, which is overseen by Prince Mohammed himself.Credit...Andrea DiCenzo for The New York TimesNov. 18, 2025, 12:52 p.m. ETPrince Mohammed said he wants Israelis and Palestinians “to coexist peacefully” in the region. While President Trump wants Saudi Arabia to recognize Israel, such a deal is unlikely anytime soon, because of the kingdom’s insistence on a clear path to the establishment of a Palestinian state before it signs on.Nov. 18, 2025, 12:51 p.m. ETPrince Mohammed said he wants Saudi Arabia to be part of the Abraham Accords and establish ties with Israel, but must be sure of “a clear path to a two-state solution” before that. He said that he discussed the issue with President Trump.Nov. 18, 2025, 12:50 p.m. ETTrump’s remarks on Jamal Khashoggi were striking, brushing off the killing of a journalist in a cavalier way: “A lot of people didn’t like that gentleman that you’re talking about, whether you like him or didn’t like him, things happen.”Credit...Mohammed Al-Shaikh/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesNov. 18, 2025, 12:46 p.m. ETIn his own response to the question about Khashoggi’s killing, Prince Mohammed said Saudi Arabia “did all the right steps” to investigate. “It’s painful and it’s a huge mistake,” he said.Nov. 18, 2025, 12:45 p.m. ETA reporter asked about the finding by U.S. intelligence officials that Prince Mohammed had ordered the killing of the Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Trump interjected and asked who the reporter was with, then began defending the crown prince. “He knew nothing about it. You don’t have to embarrass our guest by asking something like that.”Nov. 18, 2025, 12:44 p.m. ETPrince Mohammed, asked about how realistic it is for Saudi Arabia to invest $1 trillion in the United States amid lower oil prices, said the kingdom was not “creating fake opportunities to please America or please Trump.” Saudi Arabia has “huge demand” for computing power and desires U.S. chips, he added.Nov. 18, 2025, 12:40 p.m. ETUsually when President Trump is in front of a leader and starts talking about increasing the amount of international investment a country has promised to deliver to the United States — he does this not infrequently — he is met with a smile and a nod. But Prince Mohammed signaled right away that he would increase the amount to $1 trillion, a number Trump had floated.Nov. 18, 2025, 12:38 p.m. ETPrince Mohammed said that Saudi Arabia “believes in the future of America” and is going to increase its pledge to invest $600 billion in the United States to almost $1 trillion. That is the size of Saudi Arabia’s entire sovereign wealth fund.Nov. 18, 2025, 12:36 p.m. ETTrump said the U.S. can “count on $600 billion” in Saudi investments in the United States, a figure that economists say is highly unrealistic as the kingdom faces mounting fiscal constraints due to subdued oil prices and Prince Mohammed’s high spending on megaprojects.Credit...Kenny Holston/The New York TimesNov. 18, 2025, 12:35 p.m. ETPrince Mohammed has substantially increased political repression in Saudi Arabia over the past decade, while loosening social restrictions and expanding personal freedoms for women. He has faced harsh criticism from human rights groups over a number of issues, including a domestic crackdown on dissent that has landed some American citizens in prison, and a sharp increase in the number of executions.Nov. 18, 2025, 12:32 p.m. ETPresident Trump introduced Prince Mohammed as a “very good friend” as they opened their joint appearance in the Oval Office, and praised the crown prince’s track record on human rights. It is the crown prince’s first time on American soil since 2018, when Saudi agents murdered and dismembered Jamal Khashoggi, a Washington Post columnist, in Istanbul. During the Biden administration, U.S. intelligence officials released a report determining that the crown prince had ordered Khashoggi’s killing, but the White House declined to take direct action against him.Nov. 18, 2025, 11:49 a.m. ETPresident Trump gave the crown prince a tour of the aesthetic changes he has made to the colonnade near the Rose Garden. He stopped to show the prince a wall of presidential portraits, including the photo of an autopen hanging in the space where the portrait of President Joseph R. Biden Jr. would be.Credit...Haiyun Jiang/The New York TimesNov. 18, 2025, 11:30 a.m. ETThe military flyover featured several F-35 fighter jets. Trump said on Monday that he intended to sell the advanced aircraft to the Saudis, a decision that would need congressional approval.Credit...Kenny Holston/The New York TimesNov. 18, 2025, 11:27 a.m. ETPresident Trump and the crown prince chatted briefly and turned and went inside. Next, they are expected to appear together in the Oval Office as part of their official bilateral meeting.Nov. 18, 2025, 11:26 a.m. ETTrump greeted Prince Mohammed with a handshake and gave him a pat on the back as the two turned to face the South Lawn and observe a military flyover.Credit...Haiyun Jiang/The New York TimesNov. 18, 2025, 10:42 a.m. ETJamal Khashoggi in Manama, Bahrain, in 2014.Credit...Mohammed Al-Shaikh/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesSoon after Saudi Arabia’s crown prince last visited the United States in 2018, Saudi government agents killed Jamal Khashoggi, a Washington Post columnist, inside the kingdom’s consulate in Istanbul. As gruesome details about Mr. Khashoggi’s death emerged, a furor erupted around the world.Seven years later, as the crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, arrived in Washington on Tuesday to meet with President Trump, any trace of global censure was long behind him.Mr. Khashoggi was a Saudi government insider and writer who was critical of Prince Mohammed in columns he wrote for The Post. He had gone into self-imposed exile, settling as a legal permanent resident of Virginia, as Prince Mohammed oversaw a domestic crackdown on dissent in his country.A U.S. intelligence report determined that Prince Mohammed had likely ordered Mr. Khashoggi’s killing. The prince denied prior knowledge of the operation, but accepted ultimate responsibility as the kingdom’s de facto ruler.For a relatively brief period, he was an international pariah. Critics of Prince Mohammed, who is often referred to by his initials, MBS, took to calling him “Mister Bone Saw,” in reference to the dismemberment of Mr. Khashoggi. Even members of his own family quietly expressed concern.But Mr. Trump, then in his first term as president, was among the prince’s most powerful defenders. He issued a statement weeks after the killing saying that the kingdom’s relationship with the United States remained strong. “It could very well be that the crown prince had knowledge of this tragic event — maybe he did and maybe he didn’t!” Mr. Trump declared.VideoKilling Khashoggi: How a Brutal Saudi Hit Job UnfoldedAn autopsy expert. A lookalike. A black van. Our video investigation follows the movements of the 15-man Saudi hit team that killed and dismembered the journalist Jamal Khashoggi.Within months, bankers and corporate executives who had steered clear of Saudi Arabia after the killing had returned to visit. Then world leaders came back, one by one. In 2019, Japan’s prime minister at the time, Shinzo Abe, had a warm meeting with Prince Mohammed.Even former President Joseph R. Biden Jr. — who had pledged on the campaign trail in 2020 to turn Saudi Arabia into a pariah state — flew to the kingdom to meet with the prince two years later, when he needed his help to lower global oil prices.In May, Mr. Trump made Saudi Arabia the destination for the first major overseas trip of his second term. “Over the past eight years, Saudi Arabia has proved the critics totally wrong,” Mr. Trump declared during the visit.In that time, Prince Mohammed has overseen a dramatic loosening of religious restrictions in the kingdom, allowing greater social freedoms — particularly for women — while increasing political repression.Today, his main focus is no longer consolidating power but diversifying Saudi Arabia’s economy. The deadline for his “Vision 2030” program to reduce the kingdom’s oil dependence is looming.Amnesty International said in a statement released last week that there had still been “no justice” for Mr. Khashoggi, and that the meeting between Prince Mohammed and Mr. Trump comes as “human rights conditions in both Saudi Arabia and the United States continue to worsen.”