[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 52 (Tuesday, May 2, 2000)]
[House]
[Page H2347]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




       PERMANENT MOST FAVORED NATION STATUS FOR CHINA IS BAD IDEA

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 19, 1999, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Brown) is recognized 
during morning hour debates for 5 minutes.
  Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Madam Speaker, 3 weeks from this week, the 
Republican leadership will ask this House to pass legislation granting 
Permanent Most Favored Nation status trading privileges to China. This 
is a very bad idea. Let me count the ways.
  First of all, China is a nation that practices slave labor and 
practices child labor. Why should we give trade advantages to a nation 
that engages in that kind of behavior with no oversight from us, with 
no check on Chinese behavior?
  China is a nation that allows forced abortions, a government that 
sometimes encourages forced abortions, again, a violation of any kind 
of behavior that we and most of the nations around the world find 
unacceptable.
  The Chinese government, the Chinese Communist Party, is also a nation 
and a government that persecutes Christians and Muslims and Buddhists 
and also local religious sects such as the Falun Gong in a China that, 
again, has no respect for human rights.
  The government of China also has repeatedly sold nuclear technology 
to countries that have no business having that kind of nuclear 
technology that can very easily turn into weapons of mass destruction.

                              {time}  1245

  At the same time, in the last few weeks, we have seen the People's 
Republic of China threaten the Republic of Taiwan. Three or 4 years 
ago, during the last Taiwanese elections, the Chinese government, the 
People's Republic of China, the Communist Chinese Government sent 
missiles shooting into the Straits of Taiwan to threaten that Nation 
that was holding the first free elections ever in Chinese history.
  Giving China Most Favored Nation status, giving China permanent 
trading privileges with the West simply makes no sense. China is a 
market that has been closed to us. We, 10 years ago, 11 years ago, when 
President Reagan and President Bush, now President Clinton, began this 
policy of engagement with China where we would trade freely back and 
forth with China, in those days, 11 years ago, we had $100 million, 
with an ``M,'' $100 million trade deficit with the People's Republic of 
China.
  Today, after 11 years of this policy, we have a $70 billion, with a 
``B,'' $70 billion trade deficit with the People's Republic of China. 
Why? Because of slave labor, because of child labor, because they have 
simply closed their markets to us.
  Last year, we bought $85 billion worth of goods from the People's 
Republic of China. They only let us sell $15 billion of goods into 
their market. We sell more to Belgium than we do to China. We sell more 
to Singapore than we do to China. We sell more to Taiwan than we do to 
China, countries that have, at most, 1-50th the population of the 
People's Republic of China.
  No issue in my 8 years in Congress has been debated as heavily or 
lobbied most importantly, lobbied as heavily by as many wealthy special 
interest groups as the annual MFN review for China and now permanent 
trade relations with China.
  There are more corporate jets at National Airport when the China vote 
comes up. There are more CEOs individually, the CEOs of the largest 
corporations in America, walking the halls of Congress, stopping in 
every Member's office, lobbying them about supporting permanent trade 
privileges for the People's Republic of China.
  Wei Jing-Sheng, a Chinese dissident who spent time in Chinese prison 
camps, said that the vanguard of the Chinese communist party in the 
United States is American CEOs. Think about that. CEOs of the largest 
companies in this country are doing the dirty work, doing the heavy 
lifting, doing the lobbying for, doing the support of the Communist 
leaders in the People's Republic of China.
  This body would never even consider, would not even come close to 
supporting permanent trade relations with China, would not even come 
close to supporting any kind of tariff reductions, Most Favored Nation 
status, trading privileges for China, if these CEOs of America's 
largest corporations were not walking the halls and lobbying for the 
Communist leaders in the People's Republic of China.
  These same CEOs say, well, the reason we need to knock down all 
barriers to China and ignore human rights violations, ignore the forced 
abortions, ignore the persecution of Christians and Muslims, the reason 
that we in the United States should ignore the nuclear sales to rogue 
nations, the reason we in the United States should ignore slave labor 
and child labor in China is because it will help the United States of 
America, and they say it will mean 1.2 billion consumers for American 
products. The fact is their excitement is not over 1.2 million 
consumers, it is over 1.2 million workers. We should defeat China MFN.

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