Florida Republican Greg Steube has seen too many Biden administration officials dodge questions about countering China. After hearing Commerce Secretary nominee Gina Raimondo evade a question on Chinese technology firm Huawei, the Iraq War veteran and China hawk had enough.
“We know that Huawei is basically the Chinese Communist Party military company,” Steube told the Washington Examiner Tuesday, previewing legislation he will introduce Wednesday to keep the Chinese technology company on the Commerce Department’s banned entities list.
Huawei and dozens of its entities were added to the Commerce Department list by the Trump administration in 2019, preventing it from acquiring U.S. technology. In her Jan. 26 Senate nomination hearing, Raimondo refused to confirm she would keep Huawei on the banned entity list.
“Should I be confirmed and I am there, I will review the policy, consult with you, consult with industry, consult with our allies, and make an assessment as to what's best for American national and economic security,” she told Sen. Ted Cruz at the time.
PENTAGON'S CHINA REVIEW SEEN AS TRUMP-STYLE SLEIGHT OF HAND
The Defense Department has long argued that Huawei poses a national security threat if the technology can be accessed by the Chinese Communist Party and has encouraged NATO partners to keep it out of critical infrastructure.
The chief intelligence officer at U.S. Indo-Pacific Command said Tuesday that China’s economic policy is tied to strengthening its military and vice versa.
“It's alarming how assertive China has become under Xi Jinping,” Rear Adm. Michael Studeman told a virtual gathering of the Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association.
“The Chinese have been so eager to build the economy that they'll lie, cheat, and steal to do that on the international stage,” he added. "The Chinese are convinced their destiny is to be the leading power, not a leading power, the leading power."
Steube sees Raimondo’s evasion as a sign that President Biden is soft on China and will reverse Trump administration gains to the detriment of U.S. national security.
“There's a number of different examples as to how the Biden administration is reversing a lot, if not all of the Trump administration's policy as it relates to foreign policy, and China is not excluded from that,” he said. “So, I think there's significant concern that if they remove Huawei from the entity list, that would be, in my opinion, very dangerous to the national security interests of the United States.”
In a Jan. 25 White House press briefing, spokeswoman Jen Psaki acknowledged the danger Chinese technological theft poses but would not directly answer if the president plans to keep Huawei on the banned list.
“China's been willing to do whatever it takes to gain a technological advantage, stealing intellectual property, engaging in industry on the espionage and forcing technology transfer,” she said. “There is, again, an ongoing review of a range of these issues.”
The White House did not respond to an inquiry by the Washington Examiner to clarify the Biden position on removing Huawei from the list.
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Steube’s bill, Keep Huawei on the Entity List Act, requires that the company remain on the banned list until there are guarantees it does not pose a security risk to the U.S. and is not owned and controlled by the Chinese Community Party.
“If they can show that those two things have occurred, that's what she should state,” he said of Raimondo. “I think a lot of people would feel a lot more secure about her as a nominee and that the administration is not going to backtrack on a lot of these policies that the Trump administration put into place.”
