President Donald Trump visited Saudi Arabia last month to sign trade and economic deals that benefit Americans, but hidden deep in the list of collaborations between the two countries is something truly special: leopards.
In a move reminiscent of China’s diplomatic gesture in 1972, when the government allowed a pair of pandas to visit the National Zoo, Saudi Arabia will send two Arabian leopards to D.C. as part of a conservation program.
The White House put out a fact sheet highlighting the presidential visit to Saudi Arabia with a line about the “creation of a dedicated exhibit in Washington” for “the endangered Arabian leopard,” as first reported by the New York Times.
“We are honored to collaborate with the Royal Commission for AlUla to protect the critically endangered Arabian leopard,” said Brandie Smith, director of the Smithsonian’s National Zoo and Conservation Biology Institute. “Saving the world’s most vulnerable species takes global cooperation, scientific rigor and innovation—and that’s what we do best.”
Less than 120 Arabian leopards are estimated to be living in “small, isolated groups” in the Middle Eastern countries of Oman and Yemen, according to the Smithsonian.
A ‘very interested’ Trump
Smith, who was at the royal palace in Riyadh when Trump arrived, told the NYT that the US president and Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman showed a great deal of interest when told about the proposed leopard transport to the United States,
“As soon as I said leopards, I saw both of them, their attention popped,” Smith explained back in her office at the National Zoo.
Moreover, she said Trump was intrigued by the leopard’s size and danger.
“Like: ‘How big are they? What do they eat? How dangerous are they?’ That kind of stuff,” she said.
Fernando Cervantes Jr. is a trending news reporter for USA TODAY. Reach him at fernando.cervantes@gannett.com and follow him on X @fern_cerv_.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Saudi Arabia set to send Arabian leopards to US
