By Aruna Viswanatha and William Mauldin
Attorney General William Barr took aim at a range of American
companies and industries for what he described as a willingness to
accede to authoritarian demands from the Chinese government, as the
Trump administration has stepped up its rhetoric and actions
countering Beijing's recent activities.
In a speech Thursday in Michigan, Mr. Barr criticized the
Hollywood entertainment industry and Walt Disney Co. as well as
tech giants including Alphabet Inc.'s Google and Apple Inc., saying
they are "all too willing to collaborate" with the Chinese
Communist Party.
In remarks before an audience of members of the business and
university communities at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Museum,
Mr. Barr warned executives to be careful of pushing policies at the
behest of Chinese authorities, which he said could require
registration under a U.S. lobbying law.
"America's corporate leaders might not think of themselves as
lobbyists, " Mr. Barr said, telling them: "But you should be alert
to how you might be used, and how your efforts on behalf of a
foreign company or government could implicate the Foreign Agents
Registration Act," which requires lobbyists for foreign governments
or companies to register such work with the Justice Department.
Many large U.S. companies see much of their growth coming from
China, so it is unclear to what degree warnings from the
administration or the risk of bad publicity will change their
calculus.
"The ultimate ambition of China's rulers isn't to trade with the
United States. It is to raid the United States," Mr. Barr said,
adding: "If you are an American business leader, appeasing the PRC
may bring short-term rewards. But in the end, the PRC's goal is to
replace you," referring to the People's Republic of China.
A spokesman for Apple referred to previous statements in which
the company had said it was "convinced the best way we can continue
to promote openness is to remain engaged even where we may disagree
with a country's laws."
A spokeswoman for Google, whose search engine is blocked in
China, declined to comment.
A representative for Disney, which previously said the company
has "always been fully aware of the laws and regulations in
whatever country we operate in, and always adhere to them,"
couldn't immediately be reached for comment.
The Trump administration has recently targeted a range of
Chinese actions, including the country's claims of maritime rights
in much of the South China Sea. This week, the Trump administration
came out publicly in opposition to those assertions, a move that
supports Vietnam, Malaysia and other countries in the region that
have claims there. A U.S. guided-missile destroyer on Tuesday
sailed by the Spratly Islands, claimed by China and other
countries, in a "freedom of navigation" operation.
Late Tuesday, Mr. Trump used a Rose Garden press conference to
announce he had signed legislation allowing for sanctions against
people and entities linked to Beijing's new security law on Hong
Kong. That night the White House released an executive order aimed
at phasing out privileges Hong Kong has enjoyed over mainland China
in U.S. law.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Wednesday the U.S. would
decline to issue travel visas to unspecified executives of Chinese
technology firms, including Huawei Technologies, that "provide
material support to regimes engaging in human rights violations and
abuses." Earlier this month, four government departments released a
joint memo warning American firms that they risk violating U.S.
sanctions or reputational damage if their supply chains or
customers are connected with China's Xinjiang region, where
academic researchers say more than a million Uighur Muslim
minorities have been detained.
In his Thursday remarks, Mr. Barr specifically criticized
technology companies for removing apps at the request of the
Chinese government, including Apple's removal of the news outlet
Quartz's app, after it had covered the Hong Kong democracy
protests. Mr. Barr also criticized Disney for giving Chinese
government officials a role in managing its Shanghai theme
park.
In other recent speeches, the FBI director, Christopher Wray,
and Mr. Trump's national security adviser, Robert O'Brien, have
laid out what they view as the threats emanating from China in some
of the starkest terms yet.
Americans are "the victims of what amounts to Chinese theft on a
scale so massive that it represents one of the largest transfers of
wealth in human history," Mr. Wray said, speaking at the
conservative Hudson Institute last week. He also disclosed that the
Federal Bureau of Investigation is opening a new China-related
counterintelligence case every 10 hours, with nearly 2,500 such
cases under way.
"At this very moment, China is working to compromise American
health care organizations, pharmaceutical companies, and academic
institutions conducting essential Covid-19 research," Mr. Wray
said.
The Justice Department and the FBI have in particular been
focused on China's efforts at American universities to fund
scientists to essentially moonlight at Chinese universities and set
up research projects parallel to those they are conducting in the
U.S. with American government funding including the National
Institutes of Health.
Last week, for example, the FBI arrested an Ohio State
University rheumatology professor on charges of grant fraud and
making false statements for allegedly not disclosing his Chinese
government funding to the NIH, which awarded him more than $4
million in funding, according to the criminal complaint filed
against him. The professor was arrested in Alaska as he was
preparing to board a charter flight to China.
In May, researchers from the Cleveland Clinic and the University
of Arkansas were charged in similar cases.
Write to Aruna Viswanatha at Aruna.Viswanatha@wsj.com and
William Mauldin at william.mauldin@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
July 16, 2020 13:50 ET (17:50 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2020 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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