U.S. Congress gets tougher on China

The Trump administration rolls out measures against China almost every day. It's all related to Beijing in one way or another, usually through an increase in restrictions on some aspects of the relationship, from adding Chinese companies to the Entity List – a collection of individuals corganizations and individuals believed to be involved in or engaged in activities contrary to U.S. national security or foreign interests.

The White House also ordered Beijing to be expelled and punished for passing a national security law with Hong Kong.

Hong Kong pro-democracy activist Joshua Wong in front of the Capitol during a trip to Washington in 2019. Photo: AFP.

Not just from the White House

At the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue, the Capitol has also stepped up its activities with China. In some respects, the U.S. 116th Congress is arguably tougher on China than any previous term.

The U.S. Congress has played a key role in China policy for decades, notably the Taiwan Relations Act (1979), sanctions after the events of 1989, and the decision to permanently normalize trade relations with China in 1999. Some important laws do not target China but have a huge impact on bilateral relations.

Two specific recent examples are the Foreign Investment Risk Assessment Modernization Act (FIRRMA) in 2018 and the Export Control Reform Act (ECRA) in 2018. Both were passed as part of the John S. McCain Defense Licensing Act for fiscal year 2019, which aims to update regulations related to investment screening and the export of sensitive technologies.

China is not named in the law, but framing and drafting both were done with Beijing in mind.

The past two years have seen a leap in U.S. congressional activities on China. The most obvious way to see this is to keep track of China-related laws, by accessing databases from Congress.gov.

The statistics are staggering: At least 366 China-related bills have been introduced since the beginning of the 116th National Assembly, which began working in January 2019. This does not include 75 other non-binding resolutions related to China.

Most of the bills address a specific issue, but others address a variety of topics related to China. The biggest focus is on trade, trading, and investment. The proposed bills cover a wide range of aspects, from supply chain security, defense and national security, and human rights to the coronavirus and immigration.

A major highlight is the increase in the frequency of anti-China bills. In just the past six months, there has been a wave of such bills proposed and discussed by Congress, starting with a jump in March, and then a spike in May.

Most of these bills were introduced after the emergence of the Covid-19 pandemic, including blaming China for the outbreak, and to address the country's supply chain dependence. as well as expanding the domestic production capacity of the United States.

The U.S. Congress has made many proposals to punish or contain China over the past year. Graphic: Nhan Le.

The spike in bills reflects growing concerns about China in many aspects of U.S. foreign policy and life, along with the fact that members of Congress will have to become more involved in theChinese books because it is directly related to their political career.

Republicans have been more active in proposing anti-China bills than their Democratic counterparts, especially since May.

This increase is partly explained by the creation of the Republican China Working Group in the House of Representatives, which aims to promote coordination among lawmakers in introducing and passing bills.

How does it work?

Although there has been a jump in the number of bills proposed by members of both parties, there has been no equivalent increase in the number of bills passed and enacted. Of the 366 bills introduced, only 19 were passed by the House of Representatives, and only 12 received approval from both the House and the president.

Of course, some of the individual bills proposed will eventually be grouped together into a larger bill, or another government document, and there is still time for some of the bills to be passed in this session of the U.S. Congress.

Despite this, the fact is that there are more ideas proposed than adopted, and this can be described by a Chinese proverb: thunder is loud but rain is light.

But it must also be said that all 12 draft laws passed have a great impact on China. The 5G Security Act of 2019 will promote investment in technology infrastructure in non-Chinese suppliers.

According to the Washington Post, the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2020, passed in December 2019, mentions China 200 times in the report and includes a large number of measures against growing military power of China.

Meanwhile, the two laws on Hong Kong show that Washington's interest in the city is shared by both the executive and legislative branches as well as by the two parties, so one can expect a lasting U.S. opposition when the autonomy of the special administrative region is infringed.

This is worth mentioning as China has become the biggest topic of consensus between Republicans and Democrats in the context of political divisions occurring in almost all other areas.

Most of the bills discussed were on the topic of trade and supply chain security, indicating Washington's desire to reduce economic dependence on China. Graphic: Nhan Le.

Although most of the proposed bills have not found their way to Trump's desk, Congress is increasingly influencing U.S. China policy.

Moreover, lawmakers' interest in China is unlikely to wane, and we can fully expect this activity to increase in the coming years.

This is reflected not only in the laws and resolutions that have been enacted and passed, but also in hearings aimed at shedding light on issues.

Therefore, the thunderstorm we witnessed this year will most likely be followed by a heavy rain during the 117th session of the US Congress, which begins in January next year.

~According to CSIS~