House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) has tried to suggest that the new China Select Committee will be used for promoting “xenophobic activity” from “extreme MAGA Republicans.”
The Committee has been established by the Republican majority to investigate the Chinese Communist Party’s influence on American institutions.
However, the Democrats are trying to suggest that investigating the threat from China is “racist.”
The phrase “MAGA Republicans” is often used by President Joe Biden, the Democrats, and their allies in the corporate media as an intended smear to suggest Trump and his supporters are “extremists.”
During his weekly press conference on Wednesday, Jeffries was asked if he is “pleased with how Republicans are talking about and addressing China at this point?”
“It’s my hope that the approach taken by the Select Committee on the Strategic competition between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party will be serious and sober and thoughtful in addressing the strategic challenges that our country confronts relative to our relationship with the Chinese Communist Party,” Jeffries responded.
“And if that happens, then the Select committee will be in a position to perhaps present some ideas in the public domain as to how we as policymakers, should be thinking about the strategic competition between our two countries.”
“What we have to avoid is the type of xenophobic activity that far too many elements within the extreme MAGA Republican majority seem to be interested in promoting,” Jeffries added.
Asked if he held concern about “over aggression” possibly coming out of the committee and increasing tensions, Jeffries said the committee “needs to be serious and sober and balanced in how it approaches a complicated issue.”
The House minority leader also said Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-IL) has done “a very good job of articulating many of the concerns that the committee should tackle and tackle in a responsible way.”
On Tuesday, one of the witnesses at the select committee meeting, former deputy national security adviser Matt Pottinger testified that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is waging “information warfare” on the United States.
He equated the CCP to the “the Harry Houdini of Marxist-Leninist regimes; the David Copperfield of Communism; the Chris Angel of autocracy.”
Another witness, former national security adviser H.R. McMaster, pointed the finger at leaders in academics, industry, finance, and government who he accused of showing “wishful thinking and self-delusion” about the CCP’s intentions.
Chairman Mike Gallagher (R-WI) described an “existential struggle” against Communist China’s “ideological, technological, economic and military threat.”
In contrast, Ranking Member Krishnamoorthi advocated for a softer approach to counter the brutal communist regime “through investments in technologies of the future, workforce improvement and by fixing weaknesses in our economy.”
Both Gallagher and Krishnamoorthi have rejected remarks from Rep. Lance Gooden (R-TX) questioning whether Rep. Judy Chu (D-CA)Â was loyal or competent enough to participate in the committee.
During Tuesday’s hearing, Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY) argued that “calling into question the loyalty of Chinese Americans, as a member of Congress recently did, is as dangerous as it is deplorable.”
The Republicans and Democrats also came together to condemn the Chinese surveillance balloon’s transcontinental flight last month as a “violation of American sovereignty.”
“We may call this a ‘strategic competition,’ but this is not a polite tennis match,” Gallagher said during opening remarks Tuesday.
“This is an existential struggle over what life will look like in the 21st century — and the most fundamental freedoms are at stake.”
“Just because this Congress is divided, we cannot afford to waste the next two years lingering in legislative limbo or pandering for the press,” Gallagher added.
He also asserted that, if the United States does not respond appropriately to the Chinese threat, the result will be “a world crowded with techno-totalitarian surveillance states where human rights are subordinate to the whims of the Party.”
China was the subject of intense congressional scrutiny during a total of seven hearings Tuesday alone.
On Monday, House Foreign Affairs Committee announced plans to put forward a bill that would give Democrat President Joe Biden the authority to ban the Chinese social media app TikTok’s use in the United States.
