I saw an interview where Biden said he knows that this has not damaged our relationship with China because he is in constant communication with Xi. So they asked him if he had talked to Xi about this. He then said "since shooting this down? No"
So it hit me, no, not since shooting this down. Did you talk to Xi before shooting it down to get his permission? How do you know this hasn't hurt the relationship, did Xi say it would be OK to shoot it down once it had traversed the US?