Senate Says No to Allowing Federal Funds to Benefit China

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) delivers remarks during the Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearing for Supreme Court nominee Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson in the Hart Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill in Washington, on March 21, 2022. Drew Angerer/Getty Images

Bipartisan members of the U.S. Senate agreed on Oct. 31 that federal funding for military construction and the departments of Veterans Affairs (VA), Transportation, Agriculture, and Housing and Urban Development should not benefit China.

In a 61-36 vote, members approved an amendment to the Senate’s spending package for those agencies that would prohibit the use of appropriated funds to provide “grants, funding, or any financial benefit” to China-based entities or their subsidiaries.

“Whatever other disagreements we may have about the spending in these bills, surely we can agree that this money ought to go to Americans and American companies and our allies,” said Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), the amendment’s sponsor, on the Senate floor.

“All this amendment does is it says that none of the money we are appropriating can go to China,” he explained. “It can’t go to Chinese companies, or companies that are owned and controlled by China—that’s it. It’s simple: No American taxpayer dollars to the People’s Republic of China. This should be an easy vote.”

While a majority of the chamber clearly agreed, Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) warned the amendment could have “far-reaching, unintended consequences” that could complicate agencies’ abilities to do their jobs.

“If this amendment passed, VA could face challenges in obtaining products for essential mission needs like pharmaceuticals or medical devices,” she argued.

Ms. Murray further contended that school lunch programs could face difficulties procuring meat given that some meat producers and processing companies, like Smithfield Foods, are owned by Chinese companies. And the Federal Aviation Administration, she added, would no longer be able to purchase Chinese-made drones for research, testing, and training.

“We should have more time to carefully consider the impact of this amendment and the serious unintended consequences it could have before adding it to this legislation,” she concluded.

But Mr. Hawley, in response, questioned why those consequences should be considered negative.

“Do we want to be buying school lunches from China?” he asked. “Do we want to be buying pharmaceuticals from China and be dependent on them? I think not.”

Staying Vigilant

The move to restrict the flow of federal funds to China comes at a time of increasing tension between the communist nation and the U.S., as the two countries remain at odds over the independence of Taiwan and the war in Ukraine.

In recent months, leaders in the United States have sought to limit China’s influence domestically, particularly in relation to the food supply.

On Oct. 17, the state of Arkansas ordered seed producer Northrup King Seed Co.—a subsidiary of Syngenta Seeds, which is owned by Chinese Communist Party-owned China National Chemical Corp.—to sell off its farmland in the state.

Meanwhile, in July, the Senate passed an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act to ban China and other adversaries from buying up U.S. farmland.

And U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, in a September interview with CNN, said that the Biden administration is also being “vigilant about not allowing Chinese investment in the U.S. that we think hurts our national security.”

“We have to be real about those concerns,” Ms. Raimondo said. “So, to the extent that Chinese investors, buying farmland, buying U.S. businesses, erodes our national security, then we should stop it.”

Terri Wu and Naveen Athrappully contributed to this report.