Texas Senators Hear Witness Testimonies on Forced Organ Harvesting in China

Falun Gong practitioners walk in a parade highlighting the Chinese regime's persecution of their faith, in Brooklyn, N.Y., on Feb. 26, 2023. Larry Dye/The Epoch Times

The Texas Senate Health and Human Services Committee on Wednesday heard from witnesses who favor proposed legislation that would prohibit health benefit plans from paying for vital organs originating in China, where forced organ harvesting occurs.

“Senate Bill 1040 is intended to combat the horrific practice of forced organ harvesting,” said Republican state Sen. Lois Kolkhorst, who authored the bill (pdf). “In the United States, the organ donation system has high ethical standards.”

“In Texas, we celebrate those who voluntarily give the gift of life through organ donation. Unfortunately, some countries do not respect life in a similar manner.”

An identical House version of the bill, authored by Republican State Rep. Tom Oliverson (pdf), has been referred to the Public Health Committee.

Several guests shared their testimony about China’s ruling communist party (CCP) forcibly taking organs from prisoners of conscience.

Falun Gong Adherent Shares Her Experience

Crystal Chen, a Falun Gong practitioner, takes part in a candlelight vigil in front of the Chinese Consulate in New York on July 20, 2016. Benjamin Chasteen/Epoch Times

Crystal Chen of Houston told the committee that in 1999, when she was in her late 20s, the CCP began persecuting those who followed the spiritual discipline of Falun Gong.

Chen, a Falun Gong adherent, was arrested and sentenced to more than four years of forced labor without trial for refusing to give up her spiritual beliefs that teach following the values of truthfulness, compassion, and tolerance.

“My mother, also a Falun Gong practitioner, was arrested and then tortured to death,” Chen said.

She described the physical and mental abuse she suffered at various detention centers in China.

“I was pinned to the concrete floor and force-fed an all-salt mixture that nearly killed me,” Chen said.

At another detention center, she said she was handcuffed to a radiator pipe and left there for three days, where “a police chief groped her body.”

Chen said she and other Falun Gong believers were subjected to medical tests, including blood tests and EKGs (electrocardiograms).

“These tests were not done for our well-being because we were also severely tortured,” she explained, adding that only followers of Falun Gong were tested. “I learned that blood testing was [for] organ transplant matching.

“Had my blood type and type been a match for an organ recipient, I would not be able to be here today.”

Chen said this was how the CCP established its massive organ-matching database and can promise those with the financial means short waiting times for vital organ transplants.

“A large pool of Falun Gong practitioners could be killed on demand, which enables China to promise short waiting times, attracting a lot of organ tourism,” Chen told the committee members. “I shiver when I reflect on how I nearly became a victim.”

A Texas Doctor’s Story

Dr. Howard P. Monsour, chief of Hepatology at Houston Methodist Hospital in Houston, Texas, outside of London's Queen Elizabeth II Conference Centre where the 2014 Joint International Congress on Organ Transplants was held on June 4-7, 2014. Coutesy of Minghui

Dr. Howard Monsour, previous medical director of the liver transplant program at the University of Texas Houston and former chief of hepatology at Methodist Hospital, also testified before the committee.

Monsour said he first got involved with liver transplants in the 1980s when he ran the liver cancer program at Methodist Hospital.

“About eight years ago, I had a patient with liver cancer and presented to our program,” Monsour said. “He had been denied a transplant because his cancer was too large and his prognosis was too poor.”

The patient met with Monsour to ask his opinion on going to China for a liver transplant.

“He said, ‘I have a doctoral student from China who told me if I give him $80,000, I can go to China and get a liver transplant,’” Monsour said. “It was the first time I heard something like this, and I asked him to give me a little more information.”

Monsour said the patient told him that he could get a liver in China within weeks.

The doctor said he had no idea at that time what was happening in China, but he discouraged the patient because of his advanced disease.

In the United States, the wait list for a liver can be lengthy, and only those with the highest survival capabilities are added to the list.

The patient was desperate and went to China for a liver. He “ultimately died” because his cancer was too advanced, according to Monsour.

Later, Monsour learned that China was “taking these prisoners and doing blood tests to find out what their matches are.”

The American Transplant Journal recently published an article looking at heart transplants and reviewed what was going on in China, he continued.

“They found there was no way these people were on ventilators and pronounced dead for their transplants,” Monsour said. “These doctors are actually killing the patients to harvest their organs.

“I think this needs to stop, and I think this bill can do that to prevent Texans from inadvertently going and participating in this horrific crime that’s going on in China and other countries.”

Congressional Action

On Monday, the U.S. House of Representatives on Monday overwhelmingly passed the nation’s first non-symbolic measure to punish the CCP for its atrocities against the people of China.

House Resolution 1154, known as the Stop Forced Organ Harvesting Act of 2023, was approved 413-2. The law would sanction anyone involved in the act of organ harvesting and would require the government to report annually on such activities taking place in foreign companies, as reported by The Epoch Times.

Violators would be subject to a civil penalty of up to $250,000 and a criminal penalty of up to $1 million and 20 years in prison.

Falun Dafa practitioners raise awareness about forced organ harvesting atrocities in China, as they march through Manhattan celebrating World Falun Dafa Day, on May 16, 2019. Edward Dye/The Epoch Times

“It’s got real teeth. We’re not kidding,” Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.) told The Epoch Times. “This is an atrocity, this is a crime against humanity, and it’s a war crime on innocent people in China; Xi Jinping is directly responsible. Those who willingly engage in this will be held responsible.”

More than a dozen lawmakers have sponsored the measure’s companion bill in the U.S. Senate.

Next Steps

The next step for Senate Bill 1040 is for the Health and Human Services Committee to hear public testimony before voting on the bill.

“Senate Bill 1040 will not stop this practice, but it will make a very strong statement from Texas that the monies can be controlled will not go to pay for and proliferate this practice,” Kolkhorst said.