Attorney General William Barr called out U.S. companies for kowtowing to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) for short-term profits and importing censorious values in the process.
Barr delivered the third speech in a four-part series by top officials in the Trump administration on the threat of China to the United States. Barr spoke at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Museum in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on Thursday.
Barr said that the United States’ largest and most influential corporations and institutions have failed to resist Chinese influence. The Chinese government opened its country up for trade decades ago, initially treating foreign companies with a light touch but, over time, adding more stringent regulations and forcing American companies to partner with Chinese state-owned entities to keep doing business in the country’s massive economy.
“China’s economy has quietly grown from about 2 percent of the world’s GDP in 1980 to nearly 20 percent today. By some estimates, based on purchasing power parity, the Chinese economy is already larger than ours,” Barr said, according to a transcript of the speech released by the Department of Justice. The CCP is now using the country’s economic engine to force U.S. companies to abandon American values or sabotage their own long-term futures.
The attorney general outlined CCP initiatives such as “Made in China 2025,” the “Belt and Road” infrastructure initiative, and the “Digital Silk Road” initiative. He also pointed to China’s aggressive expansion into the South China Sea and its territories such as Hong Kong.
“Although Americans hoped that trade and investment would liberalize China’s political system, the fundamental character of the regime has never changed … It remains an authoritarian, one-party state in which the Communist Party wields absolute power, unchecked by popular elections, the rule of law, or an independent judiciary. The CCP surveils its own people and assigns them social credit scores, employs an army of government censors, tortures dissidents, and persecutes religious and ethnic minorities, including a million Uighurs detained in indoctrination and labor camps,” Barr said.
“If what happened in China stayed in China, that would all be bad enough. But instead of America changing China, China is leveraging its economic power to change America,” Barr continued. “The CCP seeks to extend its influence around the world, including on American soil.”
Hollywood producers are increasingly agreeing to change movie scripts according to the wishes of Chinese censors. Otherwise, Hollywood movies will not be allowed to access the Chinese market. U.S. tech companies and CEOs are working with the Chinese government, contributing to the CCP’s crackdown on its own people, the attorney general said.
“All too often, for the sake of short-term profits, American companies have succumbed to that influence—even at the expense of freedom and openness in the United States. Sadly, examples of American business bowing to Beijing are legion,” Barr said. He did note that large technology companies are beginning to push back against the CCP through “collective action” triggered over the CCP’s treatment of Hong Kong.
“In a globalized world, American corporations and universities alike may view themselves as global citizens, rather than American institutions,” Barr said. “But they should remember that what allowed them to succeed in the first place was the American free enterprise system, the rule of law, and the security afforded by America’s economic, technological, and military strength.”
“If we rekindle our love and devotion for our country and each other, I am confident that we — the American people, American government, and American business together — can do it again. Our freedom depends on it,” Barr concluded.