❓WHAT HAPPENED: A Chinese billionaire’s surrogacy plans involving dozens of U.S.-born children were scrutinized in a Los Angeles courtroom.
👤WHO WAS INVOLVED: Xu Bo, a Chinese billionaire, Judge Amy Pellman, and various surrogates and nannies.
📍WHEN & WHERE: The issue has been ongoing since at least 2023.
💬KEY QUOTE: “The boss does not accept interview requests from anyone for any purpose.” – Xu’s company representative
🎯IMPACT: The discovery of the surrogacy scheme is raising new questions regarding America’s birthright citizenship laws and potential impacts on U.S. national security.
A Chinese billionaire game developer has been discovered to have fathered around a dozen children in the United States through surrogacy, though some indications suggest he plans—or at least planned—to have upwards of 200 children born to American surrogate mothers. Xu Bo—the reclusive founder of China’s largest mobile gaming enterprise, Duoyi Network—is not alone in his paternal ambitions, as the trend of wealthy Chinese businessmen, often with deep ties to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), has increasingly seen them seeking out surrogate mothers in the United States.
The trend is raising serious concerns regarding U.S. national security, as these children will likely grow up to inherit control of companies well entrenched in China’s political, military, and intelligence apparatuses while also enjoying the benefits of American birthright citizenship. In the case of Xu Bo, his fathering of at least 12 children through surrogacy with American mothers was uncovered during a review of surrogacy petitions by Los Angeles family court Judge Amy Pellman.
Attempts by a number of media outlets to seek clarification from Xu Bo were stonewalled by his company. “The boss does not accept interview requests from anyone for any purpose,” a Duoyi Network spokesman told The Wall Street Journal.
However, the trend isn’t just confined to Xu Bo. Additional investigations have found hundreds of surrogate children in America who have been fathered by wealthy Chinese corporate executives. This trend appears to be fueled in large part by the country’s lopsided male-to-female population ratio and the CCP’s anti-surrogacy laws. Seeking politically advantageous heirs to their corporate empires in China, these men have subsequently sought out American women to provide them with male children through the United States’ comparatively unregulated surrogacy market.
The surrogate children could pose serious national security concerns in the future, as the companies they are set to inherit—by and large—have deep ties to the CCP and the Chinese military and intelligence apparatus. It is notable that people and companies that enjoy outsized success in China often do so not just because of market forces, but also because of their ties to influential figures within the communist state.
Additionally, the discovery of the surrogacy scheme is raising new questions regarding America’s birthright citizenship laws, which currently grant automatic citizenship to any child born within the legal borders of the United States. President Donald J. Trump issued an Executive Order earlier this year ending birthright citizenship. However, Democrat lawmakers challenged the policy change, and a federal appeals court subsequently ruled the Executive Order unconstitutional.
Currently, the fate of birthright citizenship is pending before the U.S. Supreme Court, with oral arguments and final decision expected next year.
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