Politico | US bill to punish Beijing over Hong Kong national security law blocked by Republican senator at White House request
- North Dakota’s Kevin Cramer is holding up bill he co-sponsored to punish Beijing for undermining Hong Kong’s independence
- Last-minute change was to allow administration push for changes to Hong Kong Autonomy Act
This story is published in a content partnership with POLITICO. It was originally reported by Andrew Desiderio on politico.com on June 24, 2020.
On June 2, Senator Kevin Cramer signed on as a co-sponsor of a bill to punish China for undermining Hong Kong’s independence. Two weeks later, he turned around and blocked it – at the request of the White House.
As a result, the bipartisan bill, which imposes mandatory sanctions over China’s continued incursions into Hong Kong’s internal affairs, is stalled on Capitol Hill even as it has broad bipartisan support.
The episode, which had not been previously reported, underscores the uphill battle for Congress’ China hawks as they push the Trump administration to punish Beijing over an array of issues, from Hong Kong to the coronavirus pandemic.
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“Even for us, this is dysfunctional,” Cramer acknowledged on Wednesday, a week after he objected to the bill’s unanimous passage on the Senate floor, after a last-minute plea from the Trump administration.
According to Cramer, the White House and State Department proposed a series of “technical” corrections to the bill only a half-hour before Senator Chris Van Hollen was set to ask for unanimous consent to pass his bill, the Hong Kong Autonomy Act.
Cramer defended his decision to block the legislation, saying he hopes the bill eventually passes but that he wanted to try to “accommodate” the Trump administration’s concerns.
Beijing hears ‘unanimous support’ for security law from cross section of society
“I hadn’t seen it yet. So my concern was, I don’t think we should do a [unanimous consent request] until we have at least considered the technical review,” Cramer said in a brief interview. “I still haven’t seen it. So I don’t know how dramatic the changes were that they were advocating or whether they hate the whole idea.”
Cramer added that the White House “asked me if I would consider” blocking the bill in the meantime, even though Cramer co-sponsored the bill.
Van Hollen said the proposed changes were “significant”, but he predicted “we may be able to work with” some of them.
“I’m confident we would have an overwhelming bipartisan positive vote on this if it came up. So we’re going to keep pushing on it,” Van Hollen said in an interview.
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The Trump administration already has the statutory authority to impose a limited set of sanctions in response to China’s recent national security law, which significantly encroaches on Hong Kong’s autonomy.
In late May, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo declared that Hong Kong, a former British colony, was no longer autonomous from China – a move that comes with significant trade implications.
“While the United States once hoped that a free and prosperous Hong Kong would provide a model for authoritarian China, it is now clear that China is modelling Hong Kong after itself,” Pompeo said at the time.
Van Hollen’s bill, which he introduced earlier this year alongside Senator Pat Toomey, would impose mandatory sanctions on individuals, banks and other entities that enable China’s violations of the 1984 Sino-British Joint Declaration, which established Hong Kong’s sovereignty.
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US President Donald Trump has come under fire for his posture toward China, including recent scrutiny over allegations made by former national security adviser, John Bolton, who claims in his new book that the president sought political favours from Chinese President Xi Jinping.
Bolton writes that Trump even encouraged Xi to continue building detention camps for religious minorities, most notably the Uygur Muslims, in the country’s Xinjiang region.
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Last week, Trump signed a bill that requires his administration to produce a report on the oppression of Uygurs and name possible targets for human-rights sanctions. However, Trump wrote in a signing statement that he would treat a key section of the bill as “advisory and non-binding” because it “interferes” with his conduct of US foreign policy.
And later in the week, Trump told Axios that he held off on imposing sanctions related to the internment of Uygurs to salvage his trade deal with Beijing.
Van Hollen slammed Trump over his recent comments and Bolton’s claims about his dealings with China. Congressional Republicans also continue to urge Trump to get tough on China for human-rights violations as well as for Beijing's handling of the coronavirus pandemic, which originated in the country’s Wuhan region.
“The administration has done nothing with the existing authority and requirements. So I think John Bolton’s book may have given us a clue here, which is that the president talks a big game, but when it comes to human rights issues, he ends up caving to President Xi every time,” Van Hollen said.
“His only priority seems to be selling more soybeans, and he’s happy to ignore human rights violations as part of that.”
