Michael McCaul

Mr. McCAUL

Mr. McCAUL. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. McCAUL. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. McCAUL

Mr. McCAUL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I want to start by thanking Chairman Meeks and Chairman McGovern for bringing this important human rights legislation to this floor. It is high time. I want to start this debate with the simple truth that we cannot afford to forget. Truly, free trade cannot involve slave labor. Today, the Chinese Communist Party is using the forced labor of the Uyghurs and other minorities to help bankroll its genocide against these very same groups. The repression taking place right now in Xinjiang is breathtaking in its scope and its brutality. It involves the detention of more than 1 million people in concentration camps. It also involves surveillance and intensive brainwashing on a massive scale. It involves breaking up families and taking children from their parents. And it involves forced sterilization and forced abortions. This should be a terrifying warning not only to China's neighbors and to the American people but also to the world. The Chinese Communist Party is fundamentally focused on expanding its power and its authoritarian style of government. It views things that it does not control, like religion, cultural identity, and the yearning of all people for freedom, as threats that must be destroyed. Because we have drawn the CCP into many of our most critical supply chains, it has the ability to hold our national security hostage while it uses U.S. consumers to subsidize its atrocities. As many as one in five cotton garments globally are potentially tainted with Uyghur slave labor. Last year alone, U.S. Customs and Border Protection seized a 13-ton shipment of human hair that originated in Xinjiang's forced labor system. It is brazen, and it is sickening. We must refuse to be complicit in the CCP's genocide against the Uyghurs, and for that reason, I support the measure before us today. I wish we could have taken this up earlier. After sending a letter to the Speaker, we are finally at the day where we are now. Last Congress, this legislation went straight to the floor. Two weeks ago, 10 members of the Foreign Affairs Committee joined me in a letter urging the Speaker to move this bill. I am grateful that our message was received. But we could send this legislation to the President's desk today by taking up the Senate version. Instead, we are setting this bill up for further legislative gridlock by passing a conflicting version, although I do applaud Chairman McGovern's efforts in this issue. Mr. Speaker, going forward, I hope the majority in both Chambers will move this to final passage regardless of pressure from the administration to not advance the American values we all share. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. McCAUL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Smith), the ranking member of the Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, and Global Human Rights. He also is the co-chair of the China Commission and has been a champion for human rights in China for three decades.

Mr. McCAUL. Mr. Speaker, I yield the gentleman an additional 30 seconds.

Mr. McCAUL. Mr. Speaker, I yield the gentleman an additional 1 minute.

Mr. McCAUL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Burchett), a member of the Committee on Foreign Affairs.

Mr. McCAUL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Rice), a member of the Committee on Ways and Means.

Mr. McCAUL. Mr. Speaker, I am prepared to close. I yield myself the balance of my time. Mr. Speaker, I know there is another bill by Senator Rubio. I hope this bill, when it passes, can be worked out in the Senate, and I hope the administration will not slow-roll this important measure, as has been reported. Out of this region we have batteries and solar panels. When Secretary John Kerry testified, he admitted that Xinjiang's solar panel production presents a problem for U.S. climate strategy, and I agree with him. In recent years, the world has stood by as the Chinese Communist Party has detained more than 1 million ethnic minorities in concentration camps where they are tortured, brainwashed, and put into forced labor. This is all a part of a deliberate program by the CCP to wipe out their ethnic identity, their religion, and their culture, anything that might compete with the Communist Party for their loyalties and affection. We have a moral duty to speak out against these horrifying crimes; but we have an even greater duty to avoid funding this genocide by paying for slave labor in Xinjiang. Many American companies have built their businesses on values that include respect for basic human rights. The United States must continue to lead the world in setting corporate responsibility standards. There can no longer be business as usual with China. China is watching and the world is watching. I support this bill, Mr. Speaker, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. McCAUL

Mr. McCAUL. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Waltz), a member of the Committee on Armed Services and ranking member of the Science, Space, and Technology Committee's Subcommittee on Research and Technology and also the Republican coauthor of this bill.

Mr. McCAUL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time. Mr. Speaker, when international institutions become unaccountable to the democratic world and are co-opted by dictators, they undermine American interests and values. That has become even clearer over the last few years. When the COVID-19 outbreak began in Wuhan, the World Health Organization's complicity and the CCP's coverup helped turn what could have been a local outbreak into a global pandemic. We are still feeling the effects of the WHO repeating the CCP's lies without scrutiny, with them covering for Xi Jinping and with them legitimizing sham investigations into the origination of the virus. The International Olympic Committee has a similar track record toward the CCP's human rights abuses. No human rights conditions were ever imposed by the IOC as a condition for China to host the 2008 Summer Olympics, and the CCP used it as propaganda to whitewash their brutal oppression. They allowed Beijing to host the 2022 Winter Olympics, once again turning a blind eye to the gross human rights violations and genocide currently being committed. Over the last several weeks, we have seen the IOC change from passively validating the CCP's abuses to actively enabling them. The most troubling example is the ongoing abuse of Chinese Olympian Peng Shuai. She was disappeared by the CCP after coming forward with serious sexual abuse allegations against a senior party member. After the world began speaking up for Peng, the CCP propaganda machine published false statements in her name. Rather than standing up for her, the IOC immediately issued public statements to validate this obvious disinformation and propaganda. Even more shocking, IOC president, Thomas Bach, participated in and publicized a staged conversation with Peng that was supervised by a senior CCP member. Mr. Speaker, it is clear that Peng is neither free nor safe. Since the 2008 games, the Chinese Communist Party has become more repressive at home, more aggressive abroad, and has begun a genocide against China's most vulnerable minorities. When Olympians from all over the world travel to Beijing in February, they are trusting the IOC to keep them safe, but the IOC's recent actions have shown that they are not worthy of this trust. I commend this resolution for holding them accountable. In closing, I want to offer a heartfelt thanks to the Women's Tennis Association and its chairman, Steve Simon. Mr. Simon and the WTA have fought for Peng bravely in an inspiring display of moral clarity and support for our democratic values. Unfortunately, this is all too rare among those with financial ties to the CCP. Mr. Speaker, I support this measure, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. McCAUL

Mr. McCAUL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Let me thank the chairman for bringing this measure with me here today. I also want to thank him for his passion on this issue. We talk about human rights, whether it was the African Americans who were enslaved in this Nation to the Native-American Indians who were mistreated by this Nation to the victims of the Holocaust where the Geneva Convention came out with the prevention and punishment of the crime of genocide and defined what genocide is after the atrocities of the concentration camps that were perpetrated by the Nazis--a war that my father fought in and bombed Nazi Germany, and I am proud for his service and the entire Greatest Generation. And it is clear, the language, it says: ``targeting members of an ethnic or religious minority group for death or serious bodily and mental harm or taking steps designed to destroy such a group constitutes genocide.'' That is precisely what the Chinese Communist Party has been doing. Since 2017, they have interned more than one million Uyghurs and members of other ethnic and religious minority groups in an effort to wipe out their culture, to wipe out their ability to carry down to other generations by sterilizing them. During their unjustified detainment, Uyghurs and ethnic Kazakhs and Kyrgyz and members of religious minority groups are forced to work in horrific conditions, they are deprived of food, and they are beaten. Their religious practices are suppressed. There are reports of families being separated and of sexual abuse, of forced sterilization, forced abortions, and even reports of killing to wipe them, quite simply, off the face of the Earth. It is horrific to imagine that this is happening in this day and time, in this time that we speak, in this age. Mr. Speaker, it is clearly a genocide under the Geneva Convention. These crimes are the moral test of our time and our generation. The world and certainly the Chinese Communist Party is watching. And that is why it is vital that we speak in a united voice with the current and prior administrations by calling these ongoing atrocities what they are, and that is genocide. Genocide is not to be taken lightly. It is a term we reserve for history's most serious crimes against humanity. It is essential we get our response right, not as Republicans or Democrats, but as Americans, as freedom-loving Americans who stand up for human rights and against genocide. Because we have faced this test before, and we have not always passed. Our response to the Uyghur genocide should be an example of our character in this Congress, rather than a stain on our history. This humanitarian crisis is about more than just U.S. foreign policy toward the People's Republic of China. It is about the legitimacy of the post-World War system designed to stop these atrocities whenever and wherever they are being committed. And it is about how we stop the CCP from contaminating consumer supply chains with slave labor. It is about how we stop using cotton sourced by the Uyghur homeland and picked by those without a voice. It is about stopping shipments of hair. It is about how we convince our private sector to act morally, consistent with our American values. So let me just say, I, again, thank the chairman. This is probably one of the most important bills to come out of the committee this year. I am proud to have introduced it, and I am so proud to have the chairman's support. I thank him for cosponsoring this resolution and all of our colleagues on the committee who support our efforts to condemn these atrocities. I urge the entire House of Representatives on this vote, because China is watching and the Uyghur Muslims are watching, to join us as we speak in a united voice and condemn this genocide by supporting this measure. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. McCAUL. Mr. Speaker, I am prepared to close, and I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, let me say in closing, I again thank Chairman Meeks, my friend, who has been in strong support of this legislation. We pride our committee in doing what is right by the country. We try to take the politics out of it as much as we can. And as Eliot Engel often said, it stops at the water's edge, and this is no exception. Mr. Speaker, this is a historic day. Congress is rarely in vote or declared genocide on another people, but it is very appropriate today to do so. And the international community is watching, and China is watching this right now. They are watching this on C-SPAN, and the world knows that the United States stands for higher moral values, and we stand for human rights. And that is why this bill was introduced, and the lives of over a million people depend on it. Think about that. A million people in internment camps, concentration camps, being exterminated, depend on this legislation. We pass a lot of things in this Congress but it is very rare you can pass something like this that condemns this kind of moral atrocity and call it to the world so the entire world can see it for themselves what is, in fact, happening. And when Congress speaks, the world does listen. And when we speak as Americans in this Chamber, not as partisan politicians, they listen. And I know they are listening today. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. McCAUL

Mr. McCAUL. Madam Speaker, had I been present, I would have voted ``yea'' on rollcall No. 430 and ``yea'' on rollcall No. 434. Members Recorded Pursuant to House Resolution 8, 117th Congress Bacon (Fitzpatrick) Baird (Bucshon) Bass (Brownley) Cleaver (Butterfield) Crist (Soto) Cuellar (Veasey) DeFazio (Brown (MD)) Demings (Soto) Dunn (Wilson (SC)) Fulcher (Johnson (OH)) Gallego (Torres (CA)) Gomez (Beyer) Green (TX) (Butterfield) Guthrie (Barr) Hagedorn (Carl) Hice (GA) (Greene (GA)) Kahele (Jeffries) Kim (CA) (McCaul) Lawrence (Stevens) Lawson (FL) (Evans) Lesko (Miller (WV)) Meeks (Jeffries) McHenry (Bucshon) Moore (UT) (Carl) Pascrell (Pallone) Payne (Pallone) Rush (Quigley) Sires (Pallone) Smith (WA) (Beyer) Swalwell (Brownley) Underwood (Casten) Wilson (FL) (Hayes)

Mr. McCAUL

Mr. McCAUL. Madam Speaker, H.R. 4256--Investing in Main Street Act of 2021, as amended. Had I been present, I would have voted ``Yea'' on Rollcall No. 349. Members Recorded Pursuant to House Resolution 8, 117th Congress Axne (Spanberger) Barragan (Gallego) Bowman (Tlaib) Brown (Mfume) Cardenas (Gomez) Cohen (Beyer) Crist (Castor (FL)) Davids (KS) (Cleaver) DeFazio (Blumenauer) Deutch (Rice (NY)) Doggett (Raskin) Fletcher (Escobar) Gaetz (Greene (GA)) Gonzalez, Vicente (Gomez) Hagedorn (Carl) Kirkpatrick (Stanton) Larsen (WA) (Connolly) Lawson (FL) (Evans) Meng (Jeffries) Morelle (Rice (NY)) Norcross (Pallone) Ocasio-Cortez (Garcia (IL)) Palazzo (Fleischmann) Payne (Pallone) Pingree (Kuster) Rush (Underwood) Schiff (Thompson (CA)) Sires (Pallone) Smucker (Joyce (PA)) Speier (Scanlon) Steube (Franklin, C. Scott) Strickland (Jeffries) Swalwell (Gomez) Thompson (MS) (Butterfield) Thompson (PA) (Reschenthaler) Titus (Connolly) Trone (Beyer) Wilson (FL) (Hayes)

Mr. McCAUL

Mr. McCAUL. Mr. Speaker, had I been present, I would have voted ``yea'' on rollcall No. 316. Members Recorded Pursuant to House Resolution 8, 117th Congress Barragan (Beyer) Cartwright (Doyle, Michael F.) Casten (Foster) Cooper (Clark (MA)) Costa (Cuellar) DeFazio (Brown) DeSaulnier (Beyer) DesJarlais (Fleischmann) Fallon (Nehls) Garcia (TX) (Escobar) Hice (GA) (Greene (GA)) Keating (Clark (MA)) Kind (Connolly) Kirkpatrick (Stanton) Lawson (FL) (Evans) Meng (Jeffries) Moore (WI) (Beyer) Moulton (Norcross) Napolitano (Correa) Ocasio-Cortez (Pressley) Payne (Pallone) Porter (Wexton) Rodgers (WA) (Joyce (PA)) Rogers (KY) (Fleischmann) Rush (Underwood) Ryan (Kildee) Sires (Pallone) Thompson (CA) (Speier) Wasserman Schultz (Soto) Wilson (FL) (Hayes)

Mr. McCAUL

Mr. McCAUL. Madam Speaker, I hereby remove my name as cosponsor of H. Con. Res. 33.

Mr. McCAUL

Mr. McCAUL. Mr. Speaker, had I been present, I would have voted ``nay'' on rollcall No. 284. Members Recorded Pursuant to House Resolution 8, 117th Congress Babin (Nehls) Boyle, Brendan F. (Jeffries) Carter (TX) (Calvert) DeFazio (Brown) DeSaulnier (Thompson (CA)) Escobar (Garcia (TX)) Frankel, Lois (Clark (MA)) Fulcher (Johnson (OH)) Grijalva (Garcia (IL)) Higgins (NY) (Tonko) Issa (Calvert) Johnson (TX) (Jeffries) Kim (NJ) (Underwood) Kirkpatrick (Levin (CA)) Latta (Walberg) Lawson (FL) (Evans) McEachin (Wexton) McHenry (Banks) Meng (Jeffries) Morelle (Tonko) Napolitano (Correa) Payne (Wasserman Schultz) Porter (Wexton) Reschenthaler (Meuser) Rice (SC) (Timmons) Rush (Underwood) Ryan (Kildee) Sewell (Cicilline) Stanton (Levin (CA)) Stefanik (Miller-Meeks) Strickland (Torres (NY)) Swalwell (Veasey) Vela (Correa) Wagner (Walorski) Wilson (FL) (Hayes) Amendment No. 41 Offered by Ms. Jacobs of California

Mr. McCAUL

Mr. McCAUL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, around the world, America and American personnel are being attacked in their homes, in hotels, and even on public streets. For most, it starts with what seems like a loud noise that is followed by pain or a sense of pressure in the head. Many are left with chronic damage, including hearing loss, vertigo, cognitive and motor impairment, severe headaches, and inability to sleep. In the words of a recent press report, our diplomats are suffering a ``concussion without a concussion.'' The Senate-passed bill before us today provides important authority to assist these brain injury victims, and it deserves our unanimous support. But we all must do more. Unfortunately, these attacks have continued and spread. First, it started in Havana in late 2016 and spread to China in 2017. Two months ago, press reports described more than 130 possible cases all over the world, including right here in Washington, D.C. Just last week, two dozen new cases among U.S. personnel in Vienna were revealed. Simply put, this is kind of scary stuff. The people who serve our Nation overseas are generally worried for themselves and their families, and they need to know that we have their backs. When the prior administration pulled our personnel out of Havana 4 years ago, they said: ``Numerous Embassy Havana employees have been targeted in specific attacks. These employees have suffered significant injuries as a consequence of these attacks.'' In contrast, President Biden has refused to call these what they are, attacks on U.S. personnel. Secretary of State Tony Blinken publicly said perhaps no one is responsible for causing these injuries. I will tell you, from my briefings and briefings in another annex, that is absolutely incorrect. We may not be able to fill in all the blanks yet, but we know too much to dismiss these attacks as unexplained health incidents. Four years ago, medical experts convened by the State Department agreed victims were likely dealing with brain trauma from a nonnatural source, and the evidence has only grown more conclusive since then. Last year, the National Academy of Sciences said that directed, pulsed radio frequency energy is most likely the cause. According to the NAS, the situation raises grave concerns about bad actors who may have weapons. While we must assist victims with today's bill, we must do more. We must call these heinous attacks what they are. They are attacks, and the people attacking us need to know the consequences will be severe when we find out who they are and when we get the attribution. Otherwise, we aren't doing what we can do to deter future attacks. The men and women who serve our Nation overseas deserve no less. I have prepared a bill to do just that, which I will be introducing this week. I thank Chairman Meeks and our Intelligence Committee colleagues for their bipartisan work on the HAVANA Act, which I strongly support. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. McCAUL. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from California (Mr. Nunes), the ranking member of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and the coauthor of the House version of this bill.

Mr. McCAUL. Mr. Speaker, I am prepared to close, and I yield myself such time as I may consume. First, I thank the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee and the ranking member, Mr. Nunes, for their strong support of this bill. It is very important. I will be introducing a bill next week on this, and I hope to work with the House Intelligence Committee on that as well. I am very concerned the administration may be planning to send U.S. personnel back to our Havana Embassy. I just got off of a big rally across the street from the White House with a lot of Cubans. They are searching for freedom and democracy over tyranny, oppression, and communism. But our personnel, we can't send them back until we can say who or what caused these brain injuries that prompted the Trump administration to pull our people out of there for their own safety in 2017. Over these last few weeks, the world has watched Cuba's brutal police state in action. The Venezuelan military is there as well, silencing people just for exercising freedom of speech, which they don't have under a communist dictatorship. The same surveillance system that tracks dissidents and censors the internet has been unwilling to share necessary information about these attacks against Americans. I have no doubt that Cuban intelligence is involved in this. If the administration sends U.S. personnel back to Havana without holding the regime accountable, all American diplomats are at risk. Again, I support this bipartisan HAVANA Act. I urge my colleagues to support it as well. I think these men and women, both State Department diplomats and our intelligence officers, deserve better from our Nation. They need to receive the proper care that they deserve. Again, I thank Chairman Meeks and the Intelligence Committee, and I look forward to its passage. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. McCAUL

Mr. McCAUL. Mr. Speaker, there is a saying: No man left behind; no woman left behind. That is the commitment and that is a promise that we made to the interpreters, to our Afghan partners, that we would not leave them behind in the dust to be slaughtered by the Taliban. They have a bull's-eye on their back. I have talked to them. I have talked to our Special Forces whom they protected in this 20-year war. They will be killed if we don't get them out of there. Our Defense Department is on a fast track. That entire country--the Taliban is on the offensive--is likely going to fall to the Taliban. The decision to withdraw completely has been made, but we have to be prepared for the aftermath. A refugee crisis and humanitarian crisis will occur. The women in Afghanistan will be tortured and will not be educated. We had a school of 200 women--girls--that were blown up. Little girls were blown up. That, Mr. Speaker, is the Taliban. That will be the same fate for our Afghan partners if we don't get them out of there now. They have 700 now coming to Fort Lee in Virginia. I urge the administration to get the rest of them. There are 9,000 interpreters, probably 20,000 total when it comes to our Afghan partners. I ask the President to please get them out before they are killed by the Taliban. Our ISR, or intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance, capability is wiped out. The Bagram air base fell to the Afghans in a very sloppy transition, and the Taliban is going to take that over, too. Now we can't see what China, Russia, and Iran are doing. We can't see what ISIS and al-Qaida are doing. We are going dark, Mr. Speaker, because we can't see anything on the ground. But I can tell you this: The moral obligation we have to save those whom we promised we would protect has to be fulfilled, and that is precisely what this bill does, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the Judiciary Committee for bringing this forward.

Mr. McCAUL

Mr. McCAUL. Madam Speaker, I missed votes due to circumstances beyond my control. Had I been present, I would have voted NAY on Roll Call No. 197.

Mr. McCAUL

Mr. McCAUL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, first of all, I want to thank the chairman for his leadership bringing this very timely bill to the floor. I want to thank Mr. Connolly for his leadership, and Mr. Chabot, who, I think, is trying to get here as well. COVID-19 could end up, at the end of the day, costing the global economy upwards of $10 trillion. Of course, the full impact of viruses like COVID-19 is not just measured in economic disruption around the world, but also in the millions of lives that have been lost, somewhere upwards of four million people. COVID-19 has proven viruses know no borders, as the chairman said. It is imperative the United States work to prevent future pandemics and be prepared to respond to diseases with pandemic potential. So, again, I want to thank my colleagues who have been involved in this for introducing the Global Health Security Act and for their work to address this important issue. This bill ensures a whole-of-government approach to prepare for and, hopefully, prevent future pandemics. It also establishes a new multilateral fund that will ensure all countries have access to the necessary resources to prevent and respond to future outbreaks. Our committee has a history of working together to achieve bipartisan success, but particularly on legislation related to global health. It is not Republican or Democrat. This is an American issue. It is also a human issue and an international issue. The Global Health Security Act is just yet another example of this great bipartisan work that we do and that makes me so proud to be a Member of Congress. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time

Mr. McCAUL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time for closing. Mr. Speaker, this is a very timely bill. We have seen utter devastation, in terms of human lives, and the economy being impacted by this. We need to ensure, Mr. Speaker, this never happens again. There will be another COVID-like virus that will be a variant. We need to work with the global community to ensure this never happens again. We also need to find out the origins of COVID-19, how this happened in the first place. Not for revenge, but to find out how it happened so we can stop it from ever happening again. I give my strong support to this important legislation. The timing couldn't be more relevant and appropriate. I thank Mr. Connolly for his leadership and the chairman for bringing this bill to the floor. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.