As far as we could tell, the only time Biden and Xi appear to have traveled together was when they visited Qingchengshan High School in Dujiangyan. In theory, one could add in the trip from Beijing to Chengdu, a distance of about 1,000 miles. But when Xi came to the United States, Biden and Xi did not even follow a parallel route to Los Angeles.

We found a clue about what Biden was trying to say when we searched as many transcript archives as we could and found a statement Biden made at a Hillary Clinton campaign event on Nov. 4, 2016: “Because the former president of China and President Obama seven years ago thought we should get to know one another, I traveled 17,000 miles through his country and our country over nine days.”