Lawmakers Ask if U.S. Companies Helped Develop China’s Spy Balloon

Plus: More congressional scrutiny on China and high-profile House GOP hearings.

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Sen. Dan Sullivan speaks during a news conference in August 2022. (Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

Good afternoon. We have a jam-packed edition of Uphill for you today. Thanks to the spy balloon that crossed the United States last week, China was the focus on the Hill this week, but two high-profile House GOP committees began their investigatory work too.

Balloon Could Add Fuel to Investment Screening Debate

U.S. officials are investigating whether the Chinese spy balloon that traversed the United States last week was made with components from American companies, according to one senator. If it was, lawmakers may revive efforts to screen outbound investments in China.

“American companies shouldn’t be helping build spy satellites that are used against their own citizens,” Sen. Dan Sullivan, an Alaska Republican, told reporters Thursday after a classified briefing. “Maybe there’s nothing. Somebody asked about it, and nobody in that briefing said, ‘Oh, it’s not a problem.’”

Lawmakers came close to a deal last year to establish a new review board to restrict American investments abroad involving “critical and emerging” technologies and important supply chain sectors such as semiconductors, artificial intelligence, and quantum computing. But some businesses pushed back, and several Republicans raised fears about giving the government too much power to block deals.

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  1. Avatar photo
    Pat @ Tavi Hall

    Is anyone tackling drones being almost totally made in China? I know major online retailers have been flirting with using them to deliver packages. That's a concern if they come with the ability to spy for China built into their software.

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    JohnM.

    This really was jam-packed, and excellent. Thanks, gang.
    " Rep. Lauren ('Lorena') Boebert (R-Twitter) said she doesn’t know “where the FBI ends and Twitter begins.”
    I would like to apologize on behalf of the sane voters of western Colorado for inflicting this performance artist on the rest of America.

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    1. Raymondbrosterhous

      What I find amazing is that she won by an eyelash in a Red CD, but has since doubled down on stupid.

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      JohnF

      At least she's being honest. This appears to be just one of many things she "doesn't know" 😏

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    Normb1442

    "...Sen. Marco Rubio, a Florida Republican, argued that the gamble America made more than two decades ago that China would become more democratic and more peaceful amid free trade between the two countries has failed."

    Thing is, folks, that the "gamble" made two decades ago had nothing to do with making China more democratic and peaceful and everything to do with increasing corporate profits by using cheap labor and opening new markets. Maybe that's how the deal was sold to the American people but it's not what sold it to boardrooms. And until non-Chinese sources of cheap labor can be found to replace Chinese workers, don't expect much to happen on that score. Even more to the point, a lot of American corporations have made Chinese markets a major focus of their planning for the future, and it's hard to imagine they'll drop them for any reason short of open warfare.

    It is not unreasonable to review the trade arrangements that grew in the last 20 years with an eye to identifying those aspects of them which might endanger our security. But even there, understand that there's going to be pushback from businesses which are ill-prepared to undo the facilities which they spent 20 years creating. As long as the discussion takes place at the current level of testosterone-fueled charges of "weakness," it's going to go nowhere. We're talking here about government telling the private sector what to do, which is something that rarely goes down easily. The bottom line is that the private sector doesn't regard national security as its raison d'etre -- profit is.

    Exposing Chinese crimes against workers is not going to accomplish anything unless the degree to which American businesses are complicit in those crimes is ALSO exposed. And I will be stunned if either House of Congress has any interest in doing that. Yelling at the CCP is one thing; yelling at a corporation which you might want to hit up for a campaign contribution is quite another.

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    1. Avatar photo
      Lorenclayroberts

      Hypocrisy reigns and the dollar is King.

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    Donald E. L. Johnson, Florida

    Is Congress planning to spur development of anti-Balloon weapons, detection systems? Can they get the Pentagon to streamline purchasing and get a solution out in a few months?

    Ukraine is teaching the world that perfect weapons that require complicated training and maintenance can be worthless when inventories run low and wars break out unexpectedly. This is not the 1940s when America needed two years to fully rearm and ramp up weapons manufacturing.

    Defense contractors seem to think they'll need another year or two to replace the weapons and supplies that we are sending to Ukraine.

    What is Congress doing about that other than investigating Hunter Biden's laptop?

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    1. Avatar photo
      Normb1442

      Trying to figure out how it can make abandoning Ukraine to Putin without looking bad.

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    Kevin Johnson

    Thanks. I’d like to see regular coverage of COVID questions, such as shadow banning, de amplification etc of Dr. Bhatticharya. US support for potentially dangerous research, etc

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