What is happening?
The second week of September marked the so-called “China Week” in the lower chamber of the American Congress. The US House of Representatives passed a series of twenty-five crucial legislative measures aimed at protecting Americans from growing military, economic, ideological, and technological threats posed by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). These threats have increasingly become a central topic within the political debate stateside, especially in the context of ongoing strategic competition between the United States and China (PRC). The newly passed bills were introduced mainly by Republican lawmakers and members of the House Select Committee on the Strategic Competition between the US and the CCP. Notably, many of them garnered broad, bipartisan support and did not solely rely on the narrow Republican majority in the lower chamber.
What is the broader picture?
The bills, which are now headed to the US Senate, cover a wide range of sectors and dimensions within the relationship between the two strategic rivals—from biotechnology and agriculture to economic and technological competition, espionage, and efforts to deter China from unilaterally changing the status quo in the Indo-Pacific region. For example, the Taiwan Conflict Deterrence Act aims to deter the CCP leadership from taking any hostile military action against Taiwan through selective sanctions targeted against the country’s top leaders, their family members, and close relatives. If the bill is passed and its mechanisms triggered, the US. Secretary of the Treasury would be required to publicly reveal a list of illegally acquired assets, property, and corrupt ownership structures of selected high-ranking Chinese officials, freeze their assets, and limit their access to the US financial system. This would effectively force affected individuals out of the country. The law could be particularly effective because many relatives and children of CCP leaders often live or study in the US and other Western countries, commonly using financial resources that Chinese politicians could not accumulate through their official salaries.
Another notable example is the Countering CCP Drones Act, which seeks to block all future models of Chinese drones from accessing US telecommunications infrastructure. Lawmakers believe that Chinese technology giants, including the state-backed Shenzhen DJI Sciences and Technologies Ltd (DJI), pose a national security threat due to their close ties to the CCP, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), and their role in the ongoing genocide of Uyghurs in East Turkestan. Following a series of previous government restrictions released over the past few years, the bill could mark the end of DJI’s operations in the US.
Last but not least, the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office (HKETO) Certification Act reflects the new reality in Hong Kong, defined by crackdowns on civil, political, and economic liberties, which escalated after the implementation of the National Security Law in the territory. The law aims to strip Hong Kong’s economic and trade office representatives of diplomatic immunity and other privileges, potentially paving the way to closing the office altogether.
Why does it matter?
While tensions between Beijing and Washington remain high, China Week allowed US representatives to pass various bills related to US-China relations. These address, among other issues, Chinese technological and economic espionage, Beijing’s malign influence within international organizations, US cooperation with Indo-Pacific allies, or instrumentalization of Confucius Institutes as tools of malign influence. However, we will have to wait and see which legislation will eventually pass through the Senate and the Oval Office in the coming months. As the US continues down the path of decoupling from China, some key questions still remain unanswered. This includes the prospect for greater transatlantic coordination of China policy as the European Union’s (EU) broad reaction to increasing Chinese malign influence around the globe has a mixed record. Given the institutional nature of the EU, which still affords the member states significant leverage over the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) and the Common Defense and Security Policy (CDSP), and the often incompatible interests of individual member states, it is clear that a European version of the American “China Week” is unlikely to happen anytime soon.
