Attorney General Merrick Garland and his fellow Democrats would have you believe that the China Initiative was a failure. That’s demonstrably not true. The Trump-era program, established to crack down on the skyrocketing instances of Chinese national security threats like economic aggressions, trade espionage, intellectual property theft, cyber crime —was successful.
Here are some recent China Initiative-related case examples from the Center for Strategic & International Studies, as previously reported by The Drill Down:
- Chinese national Suren Qin pleaded guilty to illegally exporting $100,000 of U.S. goods to PLA-affiliated Northwester Polytechnical University in China. Qin primarily sent underwater and marine technologies to the PRC through their company LinkOcean Technologies, LTD.
- Chinese national Cheng Bo, aka Jo Cheng, was indicted for conspiring to illegally export U.S. power amplifiers to China between 2012 and 2015.
- The U.S., NATO, and allies accused the PRC of using contract hackers to conduct an ongoing global cyberespionage campaign that includes ransomware attacks, cyber extortion, crypto-jacking, and rank theft.
These were wins. But not good enough for the DOJ —they killed the program last month. Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) and his fellow GOP lawmakers think that decision is unwise, and have written a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland.
“In light of the continuing national security threat posed by the CCP, and the lack of clarity surrounding DOJ’s new ‘Strategy for Countering Nation-State Threats,’ we write seeking clarity with respect to the changes in DOJ’s approach,” the senators wrote. “Specifically, its enforcement efforts to counter espionage and other illicit activities conducted by the CCP.”
The Senators want clarity. They asked questions. They likely won’t get answers.
According to Just the News, “the Justice Department ended the program, admittedly bowing to pressure from a loose coalition of lawmakers, nonprofits, and academics who argued the initiative targeted people of Asian descent with racial profiling.”
“Leading the pressure campaign to kill the China Initiative were Yale University and Stanford University. Nearly 100 Yale professors signed on to a letter castigating the DOJ program as invasive and discriminatory,” Just the News reports. “They also endorsed an earlier open letter signed by 177 Stanford faculty members to Garland claiming the initiative ‘disproportionately targets researchers of Chinese origin.'”
“We have heard concerns from the civil rights community that the China Initiative fueled a narrative of intolerance and bias,” says General Matthew Olsen of the Justice Department’s National Security Division. “By grouping cases under the China Initiative rubric, we helped give rise to a harmful perception that the department applies a lower standard to investigate and prosecute criminal conduct related to that country or that we in some way view people with racial, ethnic, or familial ties to China differently.”
It shouldn’t surprise you that both Yale and Stanford are connected to the CCP. For example, Neil Shen, managing partner of Sequoia Capital China, sits on the national committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference —and has extensive ties to Yale and the CCP.
But back to the notion that the program was racist —it’s just not true. This reasoning has been debunked and was previously reported by The Drill Down:
In his book Chinese Espionage: Operations & Tactics, Nicholas Eftimiades researched 595 documented cases of China’s worldwide intelligence collection efforts. One of his key findings: “90% of espionage activities are done by ethnic Chinese. Over 80% are male.”
Go figure.
According to the DOJ website, “About 80 percent of all economic espionage prosecutions brought by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) allege conduct that would benefit the Chinese state, and there is at least some nexus to China in around 60 percent of all trade secret theft cases.”
The program was successful! But because they fear being labeled racists, the DOJ packed it in.
Here’s a fact: Chinese espionage costs the U.S. between $200 billion-$600 billion dollars a year in stolen intellectual property. Rubio’s worried and he should be —but he won’t get anywhere writing letters to this administration.
Joe’s in deep with China.
