Stanford University will be a partner and will serve as the venue for the 2016 Global Entrepreneurship Summit with over 1,000 global delegates and hosted by President Barack Obama, the U.S. State Department and the White House announced today.

In 2015, 45.5 million visitors came to the City of Angels, an increase of 1.3 million from the previous year, tourism officials announced Monday. The numbers marked the fifth consecutive year of growth, according to Mayor Eric Garcetti and Los Angeles Tourism & Convention Board. Garcetti has set a goal of boosting tourism to Los Angeles to 50 million people per year by 2020.

President Barack Obama will host a summit with leaders from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in California on Feb. 15 and 16, the White House said on Wednesday. [...] “This unprecedented gathering – the first hosted by the United States with the ASEAN leaders – builds on the deeper partnership that the United States has forged with ASEAN since 2009 and will further advance the Administration’s rebalance to Asia and the Pacific,” 

China’s top negotiator at the UN summit on climate change practically gushed as he described his country’s relationship with California […] And with a slew of agreements with foreign leaders, Gov. Brown has turned California’s Air Resources Board and Environmental Protection Agency into de facto diplomatic organizations […] “California basically has a foreign policy,” said David Victor, a UC San Diego professor.

Almost 21 months into an administration characterized by dramatic economic and political reform, U.S. perceptions of Mexico continue to reflect an echo of Mexico’s past rather than the reality of Mexico’s present. Americans see poverty and insecurity rather than a middle-class democracy that has become a rising export powerhouse and valuable economic partner of the United States intent on deepening engagement with its northern neighbor.