Friday, March 29, 2024

EXCLUSIVE: U.S.-Based, Pro-China Lobby Group Took $350K in PPP Loans Despite MILLIONS in Corporate and State Sponsorship

The National Committee On US-China Relations – a group that advocates for closer ties to China while dismissing the national security and economic threat it poses – took up to $1,000,000 dollars worth of Paycheck Protection Program loans.

Boasting support from countless politicians, CEOs, and academics, the Committee represents the non-governmental arm of the American establishment who willingly work with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

The National Committee on US-China Relations (NCUSCR) bills itself as “promoting understanding and cooperation between the United States and Greater China” through euphemistic strategies such as “forthright dialogue, mutual understanding, and constructive cooperation.”

But from Walmart executives to Walt Disney Company Vice Presidents, the NCUSCR’s board is a who’s who of the corporates responsible for shipping American jobs overseas.

Despite endowments in the tens of millions from corporates and even the U.S. State Department, the committee received between $350,000 and $1,000,000 from the U.S. federal government according to Treasury Department’s records released on Monday.

CCP Sellouts.

Henry Kissinger, who routinely appeased the CCP as U.S. Secretary of State, serves as the group’s Executive Vice Chair. Three additional affiliates, J. Stapleton Roy and Robert Daly of the Kissinger Institute along with Joshua Cooper Ramo of Kissinger Associates, are also on the board.

Its 2019 Gala Honorary Chairs included former Presidents Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, responsible for large-scale outsourcing and repeatedly failing to confront the rise of the CCP. Former U.S. Ambassador to China Max Baucus, exposed by the National Pulse for leveraging his government positions to lobby on behalf of CCP-linked Alibaba and contribute to Chinese state media, was an Honorary Vice Chair.

NCUSCR President Stephen Orlins frequently contributes to CCP-owned media outlets such as China Global Television Network (CGTN), a registered foreign agent in the U.S. identified as a “long-standing weapon in Beijing’s arsenal of repression.”

Despite this, the committee’s website boasts of Orlins’s appearances on the network and invites other state-owned outlets to cover their annual gala.

Orlins hailed the previous four decades of China relationships – chiefly China’s entrance to the World Trade Organization – as advantageous to the United States, calling critics of the policy which led to the loss of millions of American jobs “fundamentally wrong”.

He also believes that fears of Chinese Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), the primary avenue whereby the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) takes control of U.S. companies and engages in intellectual property theft, are an “overreaction.”

Reacting to the prevalence of the dangerous practice waning under the Trump administration, Orlins commented:

“It made me sad, and I kept thinking of ways of how can we bring it back, how can we get the Chinese to invest more in the United States.”

It’s no surprise, therefore, that China-based Wanxiang America Corporation, which has a long track record of predatory acquisitions of American companies, is a Chair of the committee.

The company is also an enabler of outsourcing American jobs with its “China-America Source Program” and has been known to gobble up American companies – nearly two dozen – since its founding in 1994.

As Peter Schweizer points out in Secret Empires, the company’s modus operandi is adding connected individuals to its rolodex:

“It has also collected powerful political friends on both sides of the aisle, by putting them and their family members on the payroll. Along the way, it has skated past federal regulations and avoided sanctions for doing business in North Korea that have plagued other companies. It offers a powerful illustration of how politically connected firms make members of the American political class wealthy while getting special treatment in the United States.”

CCP Collaborators.

The committee frequently provides a platform for CCP officials to spew talking points. At a 2019 NCUSCR event in New York, Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi declared:

“There is a claim in the United States that the country has been ‘ripped off’ in its cooperation with China, Is that really so? Of course not.”

Despite Wang’s insistence that a rising China is a boon to the American economy, the millions of jobs lost, intellectual property theft, and massive trade deficits tell a different story.

He also defended China’s surveillance and imprisonment of Uighurs in Xinjiang Province as having a “clear-cut purpose” of “preventing extremism and terrorism.”

Wang doubles down:

“These measures are consistent with Chinese law and common approaches advocated in the global community. We are fully open and aboveboard, and we are confident that no vile smears will work.”

The NCUSCR has also collaborated with the CCP by utilizing Confucius Institutes, “an important part of China’s overseas propaganda setup” according to Politburo propaganda czar Li Changchun masquerading as language and culture initiatives, to amplify their events such as an annual China Town Hall.

The fact NCUSCR content is allowed to air in Confucius Institutes across the country demonstrates the CCP’s affinity for the committee and solidifies its reputation as a staunch party sycophant.

The NCUSCR also has a foothold on American college campuses by sponsoring speeches such as “Anti-Asian Racism in the United States and Sino-American Relations.”

The funneling of federal dollars to the NCUSCR is at odds with the Trump administration’s hard-line approach to China and follows millions being distributed to CCP-linked companies and state-owned enterprises.

While America ought to be divesting from the regime, it appears some are openly collaborating and funding its enablers.

More From The Pulse