During remarks on the House floor Thursday, Rep. Andy Ogles (R-TN) spoke about President Biden's stance towards China.
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NewsTranscript
00:00Pursuant to House Resolution 1316, the gentleman from Tennessee, Mr. Ogles, and a member opposed,
00:05each will control five minutes.
00:07The chair recognizes the gentleman from Tennessee.
00:09Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
00:11The Section 1260H was established by the Fiscal Year 21 NDAA to blacklist Chinese companies
00:19with close ties to the People's Liberation Army, as well as other companies' so-called
00:23civil-military fusion contributors.
00:26The FY 2023 NDAA went even further, applying sanctions for those entities on the list.
00:33Section 1260H certainly hurts a company's shareholder value, which is the point.
00:39It protects American investors from unwittingly supporting companies underwriting China's
00:44military modernization and or genocide.
00:48This amendment simply ensures that for the coming fiscal year, the Biden administration
00:53cannot remove any CCP company designated for the Department of Defense Section 1260H
00:59list.
01:00I understand there is similar language in the underlying bill, but the language has
01:03a waiver so broad you could drive a Chinese tank through it.
01:07I'm therefore offering it as a standalone to continue to push for full funding prohibition.
01:12I reserve.
01:14Gentleman reserves.
01:15For what purpose does the gentleman from Minnesota seek recognition?
01:18Mr. Chair, I claim time in opposition.
01:21Gentlewoman from Minnesota claims the time in opposition.
01:23The gentleman is recognized for five minutes.
01:25Thank you, Mr. Chair.
01:26I rise in opposition.
01:29As was pointed out, Section 1260H of FY21 NDAA requires the Secretary of Defense to
01:35maintain a list of Chinese military companies that's operating directly or indirectly
01:40in the United States, and publicly report such a list.
01:43And this list is required to be submitted annually until December 31, 2030.
01:53And we have oversight over that, and we should exercise our oversight.
01:58The NDAA gave the Secretary the authority to make additions and deletions to the list
02:03in subsection B3.
02:07The FY25 bill already includes this provision, consistent with current law.
02:12So this has been the law since FY2021 when the NDAA required the Secretary of Defense
02:17to maintain these lists.
02:20The amendment would remove the Secretary's ability to modify the list, and it's an expansion
02:26of current law.
02:27If the Secretary were to modify the list, Congress would know about it, and Congress
02:33could do its oversight due diligence if they thought there was something out of order.
02:38So given that the bill already includes this language, and the amendment would remove
02:42the authority of the Secretary to make the necessary judgments, I oppose this amendment.
02:48Because this amendment, and if the gentleman can correct me if I'm wrong, would suppose
02:54that the Secretary would disregard the law flagrantly, and not fulfill their obligation.
03:03And I believe the Secretary will, whether it's a Republican Secretary of Defense or
03:08Democratic Secretary of Defense, fulfill the law, do their work correctly, Congress sees
03:15the report, and if Congress thinks that there's something amiss, we do our oversight.
03:21With that, I oppose the amendment, and I do reserve the balance of my time.
03:25General in Reserves, the gentleman from Tennessee is recognized.
03:27This amendment is necessitated by the fact that at every opportunity, our President has
03:32chosen to placate rather than punish China.
03:35Appeasement has long been a failed strategy, and it continues to fail us today.
03:40Last year, Joe Biden unilaterally removed 27 CCP entities from the Commerce's unverified
03:45list, all to ensure that Junior Raimondo could simply secure a meeting with their CCP counterpart.
03:52Similarly, in November, Joe Biden removed an agency of China's police, an agency which
03:57uses DNA to collect genetic information on Uyghur detainees from Commerce's entity list.
04:03Joe Biden made this decision on a mere commitment from China that they would cooperate with
04:10us on confronting drug trafficking.
04:12Well, I can tell you that the drug overdoses in my state last night, and your state last
04:20night, and his state last night, would conflict with this idea that China's cooperating with
04:25us, that they're doing anything to stem the flow of precursor chemicals for fentanyl into
04:30this country.
04:32So this amendment is quite necessary.
04:35And she's right.
04:36It amends the law.
04:37It removes the Secretary's ability to do so, and it puts Joe Biden in a box where hopefully
04:44he can't get lost.
04:45I reserve.
04:46Gentleman in Reserves, the gentleman from Minnesota is recognized.
04:50I'm in opposition.
04:51I have the right to close, do I not, Mr. Chair?
04:55The gentleman is correct.
04:56Then I will reserve my time for now.
04:59Gentleman in Reserves, the gentleman from Tennessee is recognized.
05:01Mr. Chairman, increased scrutiny of these companies is a national security imperative,
05:06and delisting these companies, these Chinese military companies, cooperators, and genocide
05:11and proponents of the PLA's military modernization must be an absolute non-starter.
05:17We've got to put America first, whether that's our border, whether that's Commerce, and most
05:22certainly our military.
05:24And we've got to take a stand and put Biden in his place, and not let him delist these
05:29companies for political or monetary gain.
05:32With that, Mr. Chairman, I urge adoption of my amendment, and I yield back.
05:37Gentleman yields back.
05:38The gentleman from Minnesota is recognized.
05:40Mr. Chair, the gentleman who's offering the amendment is entitled to his opinions.
05:47But I do believe when we are talking about the President of the United States on the
05:51House floor, are we not supposed to refer to Mr. Biden as the President?
06:15I see the parliamentarians are discussing this.
06:18I won't ask for any more time to have you answer the question, because they would give
06:24you the advice on that.
06:26But there have been times, Mr. Chair, when I've been in your position, when things were
06:33happening pretense before about conversations, and it was my understanding, but I'll move
06:41forward.
06:42The gentleman, as I said, he's entitled to his own opinion.
06:46And his opinion is that he does not trust the President of the United States, and he
06:51does not trust the Secretary of Defense.
06:55I do.
06:56I believe that they will carry forward and uphold the law.
07:02The gentleman did point out something about these precursor drugs that I think the gentleman
07:07and the Chair and I both agree with.
07:09And that is, China needs to crack down on them more.
07:14That means we need to crack down on China.
07:16But as soon as we list one of these chemical combinations, they come up with another one.
07:21So I've been urging, along with other people in the White House, is to figure out how we
07:26write this in a way that we can make sure that we capture all these chemicals that are
07:32used to murder Americans.
07:36And the last thing I would say on that, we just did the border security bill, the Homeland
07:42Security bill.
07:44And some of the technology provisions that would have allowed us to capture a lot of
07:49this at the border, unfortunately, were cut by the Republicans' bill that they put forward.
07:57So there's work to do.
07:58I agree.
07:59But I do trust the Secretary of Defense.
08:01I do trust the President of the United States to uphold the law of the land.
08:05And with that, I yield back.
08:08Gentleman yields back.
08:09All time for debate having expired.
08:11The question occurs on the amendment offered by the gentleman from Tennessee.
08:15Those in favor, so signify by saying aye.
08:18Those opposed, say no.
08:21The opinion of the chair, the ayes have it.
08:22The amendment is agreed to.