Bipartisan Passage of Organ Harvesting Bill in House Moves US Closer to Holding CCP Officials Accountable

Falun Gong practitioners march down Constitution Avenue to commemorate the 23rd anniversary of the Chinese Communist Party's persecution of the spiritual practice in China, in Washington on July 21, 2022.Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times

“Murderous,” “grotesque,” “immoral,” “barbaric.”

The Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP’s) practice of forced organ harvesting has appalled Washington and united lawmakers from both sides of the aisle.

As a bill seeking to end the atrocity continued to advance—passing the House by a vote of 413–2—members of Congress cheered the development and reaffirmed their determination to hold the Chinese regime accountable.

“Forced organ harvesting is cruel and immoral, often targeting ethnic and religious minorities and some of the most vulnerable groups in the world,” said Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.), who co-leads the Senate version of the Stop Forced Organ Harvesting Act.

As a co-chair of the Senate Human Rights Caucus, he expressed pride in seeing the bill pass the House and getting “closer to empowering the Biden administration to take action against those who practice this despicable crime.”

‘Mass Murder of Innocents’

As early as 2006, witnesses had been raising the alarm on Beijing’s state-sanctioned killing of detained practitioners of Falun Gong, a faith that the regime has waged an all-out campaign to eradicate for nearly 24 years.

After rising in popularity in the 1990s, the spiritual practice, which features meditative exercises and moral teachings centered on truthfulness, compassion, and tolerance, became a target of a brutal persecution campaign, resulting in millions of adherents being detained for their belief.

A 2019 investigation by the London-based China Tribunal found detained Falun Gong practitioners to be the primary victim group of forced organ harvesting. Other prisoners of conscience, including Uyghurs in Xinjiang concentration camps, Tibetans, and House Christians, are also targets, the tribunal said.

Passing the House on March 27, the bill is the first of its kind in the United States to combat the bloody act through legislative tools, a feat lauded by human rights groups.

“The Stop Forced Organ Harvesting Act of 2023 is one of the most significant international responses to the China Tribunal’s Judgment to date,” said Susie Hughes, executive director of the International Coalition to End Transplant Abuse in China. She expressed hope that more governments will be inspired to follow the United States’ footsteps “to ensure their own citizens are not caught up in the mass murder of innocents for their organs in China.”

Falun Dafa practitioners hold placards in a parade to bring awareness to the Chinese regime's brutal practice of forced organ harvesting in China, in Manhattan, New York, on May 16, 2019. Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times

Washington-based advocacy group Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation echoed this sentiment.

“The passage of this legislation sends a clear message to not only China, but the rest of the world that the United States will not turn a blind eye to this atrocity, one that has been shamefully ignored by institutions and governments influenced by China for far too long,” said the foundation’s president, Andrew Bremberg, a former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. He urged the Senate to “quickly take up this bill, pass it, and send it to President [Joe] Biden so it can become law.”

‘A Moral Issue That Transcends Politics’

Rep. Greg Murphy (R-N.C.), a former transplant surgeon, found the idea of forced organ harvesting both “horrifying and repulsive.”

“This is a moral issue that transcends politics,” he told The Epoch Times. “It is a matter of good versus evil, and it is the responsibility of the United States to take the lead against this murderous practice, especially as it relates to the CCP.”

A man jogs past Falun Gong practitioners using a mock organ harvesting display as part of their protest against the CCP and its persecution of Falun Gong practitioners, on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Canada, on May 2, 2008. Tom Hanson/The Canadian Press

The House Democratic Caucus agreed that calling out the CCP’s human rights abuses is one issue that crosses party lines.

“We seek out—as we always do—to work with Republicans to find common ground on issues that help our communities, help our country, and send the right message on human rights, and this was one of those bills,” Pete Aguilar (D-Calif.), chair of the caucus, told reporters in a press conference on March 28.

Rep. André Carson (D-Ind.), a member of the Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, similarly committed to “working across the aisle to examine the very real human rights abuses committed by the Chinese government.”

“Among the most disturbing is the tolerance and active support of illegal harvesting of organs from nonconsenting individuals—including as a way to perpetuate the genocide of the Uyghur people, which our committee held a hearing on last week. HR 1154 is a step forward in ensuring U.S. government resources are not taken advantage of to support this heinous practice,” he told The Epoch Times.

Holding Perpetrators Accountable

Under the repressive environment in communist China, the targeted groups have largely been left feeling helpless under the persecution, in which authorities have tortured their loved ones to death and taken their organs without their consent. Many, despite having escaped to the United States, continue to fear for their family in China, who face an ever-present threat of harassment and arrest.

Falun Gong practitioners take part in a candlelight vigil commemorating the 20th anniversary of the persecution of Falun Gong in China, on the West Lawn of Capitol Hill on July 18, 2019. Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times

“China’s genocidal regime has subjected groups Beijing deems a threat, including Uyghurs and Falun Gong practitioners, to unimaginable human rights violations—including credible allegations of forced organ harvesting,” Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), a co-signer of the Senate bill, told The Epoch Times. “The United States must hold the CCP accountable for these savage crimes.”

What the regime has done in its suppression of ethnic and religious groups is “beyond comprehension,” said Rep. Mark Green (R-Tenn.), who co-sponsored the House measure.

“The CCP is trampling on the rights of its own citizens in the most grotesque way imaginable—forced organ harvesting of political prisoners. This is beyond the pale,” he told The Epoch Times.

Aumua Amata Radewagen, a Republican representing American Samoa, said she has met with Uyghur refugees whose “devastating experiences and ongoing suffering” saddened her.

“They describe unthinkable, heartbreaking, horrifying crimes, and Congress must continue to do its part to ensure that these victims are not forgotten and have a strong voice in America,” she told The Epoch Times.

In April 2022, a peer-reviewed research paper published in the American Journal of Transplantation (AJT) flagged 72 Chinese papers containing data from cases where the cause of death appears to be the transplant surgery itself, prompting the authors of the AJT paper to call these Chinese doctors “executioners.”

“China’s medical ethics should not come as a surprise as the world fully knows about the Chinese Communist Party’s genocide against the Uyghurs,” Rep. French Hill (R-Ark.) told The Epoch Times, going on to describe the forced organ harvesting as “a repugnant practice carried out against minority groups in China, including the Uyghurs and Falun Gong practitioners.”

The bill’s imposition of fines and imprisonment on the offenders, as well as sanctions for those who “fund, sponsor, or facilitate” the abuse, are critical actions to “deter those engaged with this disgusting practice,” Hill said. “We must continue to act in Congress to combat this barbaric practice.”

While the abuse has been an issue around the globe, China is one of the worst countries where forced organ harvesting runs rampant, Rep. Gus Bilirakis (R-Fla.) said.

“Our hope is that this important legislation will help deter this abhorrent practice and ensure that those who engage in this type of conduct cannot seek safe haven in the United States,” he told The Epoch Times.