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The company logo is seen on the Micron Technology offices in Shanghai, China May 25, 2023. Photo: Reuters

House lawmakers urge US to rally allies over China Micron ban

  • ‘We must quickly work with Japan and South Korea to ensure Japanese and South Korean companies do not undercut Micron’, the lawmakers said
  • Mike Gallagher previously urged the US commerce secretary to put trade curbs on Changxin Memory after Beijing’s actions against Micron

The Republican chairmen of two House of Representatives panels on Friday urged President Joe Biden’s administration to rally US allies including Japan and South Korea to defeat Chinese “economic aggression” in the wake of Beijing’s effective ban on purchases of Micron Technology memory chips.

Michael McCaul, who heads the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and Mike Gallagher, chairman of the House select committee on the Chinese Communist Party, sent a letter to US Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo urging the administration to take action after China targeted the biggest US memory chip maker.

China’s cyberspace regulator said on May 21 that Micron had failed its network security review and it would bar operators of key Chinese infrastructure from buying from the company, the latest development in an ongoing dispute over chip technology between Washington and Beijing. The move came a day after leaders of the G7 industrial democracies agreed to new initiatives to push back against Chinese economic coercion.

Micron subsequently predicted a revenue reduction.

McCaul and Gallagher urged Raimondo to work with Japan and South Korea to ensure that companies from those countries “do not take market share lost to the ban and undercut Micron.” The lawmakers added that China “lashed out with an arbitrary economic embargo against one American company. Now, the United States must ensure that this economic aggression fails.”

The Commerce Department must rally US partners and allies, they said.

“We must quickly work with Japan and South Korea to ensure Japanese and South Korean companies do not undercut Micron by taking its sales that were lost to the PRC’s unjustifiable boycott,” they added, referring to the People’s Republic of China.

Raimondo on Saturday said the United States will not tolerate China’s action and is working closely with allies to address such “economic coercion.”

A Micron SSD is displayed at the Computex expo in Taipei, Taiwan May 30, 2023. Photo: Reuters

The Chinese Embassy in Washington and a spokesperson for the Commerce Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

McCaul and Gallagher said China’s action against Micron “should not deter but should rather invigorate export control actions against PRC companies that may threaten US national security or foreign policy interests”, like Chinese memory chip maker Changxin Memory Technologies.

“Failure to impose a cost upon the PRC for its malign behaviour will only invite further such conduct,” they added.

Reuters has reported Gallagher previously urged Raimondo to put trade curbs on Changxin Memory after Beijing’s actions against Micron.

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