President Donald Trump is reportedly planning to enact a series of hardline policies going after communist China during the final weeks of his administration.
Part of Trump’s goal is to “make it politically untenable for the Biden administration to change course” on the policies “as China acts aggressively from India to Hong Kong to Taiwan, and the pandemic triggers a second global wave of shutdowns,” Axios reported.
National Security Council spokesperson John Ullyot told Axios: “Unless Beijing reverses course and becomes a responsible player on the global stage, future U.S. presidents will find it politically suicidal to reverse President Trump’s historic actions.”
The administration plans to take additional actions against Chinese companies and government entities for a variety of human rights violations and matters involving U.S. national security. The report said to watch out for Director of National Intelligence (DNI) John Ratcliffe to explain China’s criminal activity inside the U.S. to the American public in the near future.
DNI senior adviser Cliff Sims said, “Director Ratcliffe will continue playing a leading role, in coordination with other national security principals, in delivering a necessary mindset shift from the Cold War and post-9/11 counterterrorism eras to a focus on great power competition with an adversarial China.”
The report comes as Trump has said for months that he would be cracking down on China for a variety of issues, nearly all of which have been magnified by the coronavirus pandemic that originated in Wuhan, China. The Washington Post reported in April that senior U.S. officials were laying out plans for taking retaliatory actions against China for the pandemic.
Throughout the year, top U.S. officials have given speeches outlining the threats posed to the United States by communist China. The officials include Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Attorney General William Barr, FBI Director Christopher Wray, and National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien.
In late May, Trump gave a statement in the Rose Garden about the United States’ relationship with China.
Trump said in part:
China’s pattern of misconduct is well known. For decades, they have ripped off the United States like no one has ever done before. Hundreds of billions of dollars a year were lost dealing with China, especially over the years during the prior administration. China raided our factories, offshored our jobs, gutted our industries, stole our intellectual property, and violated their commitments under the World Trade Organization. To make matters worse, they are considered a developing nation getting all sorts of benefits that others, including the United States, are not entitled to.
But I never solely blamed China for this. They were able to get away with a theft like no one was able to get away with before because of past politicians and, frankly, past presidents. But unlike those who came before, my administration negotiated and fought for what was right. It’s called: fair and reciprocal treatment.
China has also unlawfully claimed territory in the Pacific Ocean, threatening freedom of navigation and international trade. And they broke their word to the world on ensuring the autonomy of Hong Kong.
The United States wants an open and constructive relationship with China, but achieving that relationship requires us to vigorously defend our national interests. The Chinese government has continually violated its promises to us and so many other nations.
These plain facts cannot be overlooked or swept aside. The world is now suffering as a result of the malfeasance of the Chinese government. China’s cover-up of the Wuhan virus allowed the disease to spread all over the world, instigating a global pandemic that has cost more than 100,000 American lives and over a million lives worldwide.
Chinese officials ignored their reporting obligations to the World Health Organization and pressured the World Health Organization to mislead the world when the virus was first discovered by Chinese authorities.
Countless lives have been taken, and profound economic hardship has been inflicted all around the globe. They strongly recommended against me doing the early ban from China, but I did it anyway and was proven to be 100 percent correct.
China has total control over the World Health Organization, despite only paying $40 million per year compared to what the United States has been paying, which is approximately $450 million a year.
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For years, the government of China has conducted illicit espionage to steal our industrial secrets, of which there are many. Today, I will issue a proclamation to better secure our nation’s vital university research and to suspend the entry of certain foreign nationals from China who we have identified as potential security risks.
I am also taking action to protect the integrity of America’s financial system — by far, the best in the world. I am instructing my Presidential Working Group on Financial Markets to study the differing practices of Chinese companies listed on the U.S. financial markets, with the goal of protecting American investors.
Investment firms should not be subjecting their clients to the hidden and undue risks associated with financing Chinese companies that do not play by the same rules. Americans are entitled to fairness and transparency.
Several of the most significant actions we’re taking pertain to the deeply troubling situations unfolding in Hong Kong.
This week, China unilaterally imposed control over Hong Kong security. This was a plain violation of Beijing’s treaty obligations with the United Kingdom in the Declaration of 1984 and explicit provisions of Hong Kong’s Basic Law. It has 27 years to go.
The Chinese government’s move against Hong Kong is the latest in a series of measures that are diminishing the city’s longstanding and very proud status.
This is a tragedy for the people of Hong Kong, the people of China, and indeed the people of the world. China claims it is protecting national security. But the truth is that Hong Kong was secure and prosperous as a free society. Beijing’s decision reverses all of that. It extends the reach of China’s invasive state security apparatus into what was formerly a bastion of liberty.
China’s latest incursion, along with other recent developments that degraded the territory’s freedoms, makes clear that Hong Kong is no longer sufficiently autonomous to warrant the special treatment that we have afforded the territory since the handover.
China has replaced its promised formula of “one country, two systems” with “one country, one system.”
This article has been expanded after publication to include additional information.