Congressional panel urges US to toughen up on China as tensions between two countries grow
WASHINGTON – The U.S. must get serious about the threat posed by China, the head of a special congressional committee said Tuesday at the panel’s first hearing.
“We may call this a `strategic competition,’ but it’s not a polite tennis match,” Rep. Mike Gallagher, R-Wis., said in his opening remarks. “This is an existential struggle over what life will look like in the 21st century – and the most fundamental freedoms are at stake.”
Gallagher heads the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, a new panel created when Republicans took control of the House. But the committee has bipartisan aspirations.
Gallagher, a former Marine and intelligence officer who has worked across the aisle on China legislation, said there’s no time to waste on partisan infighting.
“We must act with a sense of urgency,” Gallagher said. “Our policy over the next ten years will set the stage for the next hundred.”
Why it matters?
Tensions have been rising with China, which the U.S. considers its biggest strategic and economic competitor. Even before the Biden administration shot down a Chinese spy balloon off the coast of South Carolina, the nations have clashed over Taiwan, technology, human rights, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and other issues.
recently warned they have intelligence suggesting China is considering providing lethal support to Russia.
Congress is contemplating a bill that would give President Joe Biden the power to enact nationwide bans on TikTok, the popular Chinese-owned social media platform, and other software applications considered a risk to national security.
sweeping bipartisan bill aimed at boosting domestic manufacturing of computer chips and countering China’s edge in that sector.
“The CCP is counting on us to be divided,” said Illinois Rep. Raja Krishnamoorth, the panel’s top Democrat. “We must rise to the occasion and prove them wrong.”
Emphasis on human rights
The committee emphasized human rights, pointing to a video highlighting abuses over the past 70 years. It also focused on the testimony of Tong Yi, a Chinese human rights advocate, who was jailed in China for more than two years.
The events touched on in the video included China’s Great Leap Forward, the Cultural Revolution, the Tiananmen Square protests, what the U.S. government says is a “genocide” by the Chinese government against the Uyghurs, and China’s “Zero COVID” policy.
Gallagher said the committee is drawing a distinction between “the Chinese Communist Party and the Chinese people themselves, who have always been the party’s primary victims.”
Charges of U.S. complicity
Lawmakers and witnesses blamed U.S. policy and companies for aiding and abetting China to gain an unfair economic advantage.
Scott Paul, president of the Alliance for American Manufacturing, charged “Big Tech, Hollywood, sports leagues, retail legends” with “bending the knee” to the Chinese Communist Party.
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