GOP House Majority preps China cudgels

What's next in U.S.-China relations.

Nov 10, 2022 View in browser   By Phelim Kine House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (arrives for a press conference at the U.S. Capitol June 23, 2021, in Washington, D.C. | Win McNamee/Getty Images Hi, China Watchers. This week we assess the impact of U.S. midterm elections on U.S.-China relations, examine the U.S.-China rivalry at the United Nations COP27 climate talks and mark how a U.S. citizen that the State Department deems a "wrongful detainee" is about to hit his tenth year behind bars in China. We'll also place bets on ASEAN summit fist-bump diplomacy and profile a book that warns that Beijing is packing its environmental protection toolbox with repressive population surveillance and control mechanisms. Let's get to it. — Phelim The GOP is on track to flip the House . That will put some of Capitol Hill's most outspoken Republican China hawks at the controls of key Congressional committees. Brace for a cascade of House-led China-focused hearings and investigations that will put Beijing and anyone or anything linked to its alleged malign activities (spoiler alert: both HUNTER BIDEN and TikTok are on the shortlist) in the hot seat until at least end-2024. For a sneak peek at what that might look like, here's your China Watcher GOP House Guide Early Bird Edition . The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace hosted a discussion on Wednesday with American, Chinese and Singaporean diplomatic experts on how a Republican midterm victory in either or both the House and Senate might affect bilateral ties. Of particular note, was an argument made by PAUL HAENLE, a former National Security Council China director, of the impact that a potential Republican majority driven to restrict China's access to high technology products such as semiconductors may have on countries in the Indo-Pacific whose economies rely on economic ties with both the U.S. and China.   "If there is going to be more tension or distance between the U.S. and China on technology…countries in the [Indo-Pacific] region that are part of that whole supply chain and technology chain — like Singapore, Taiwan, Korea, Japan — will be under a lot more pressure [to declare] which side they [are on] and on how they shield off different parts of their businesses" from those tensions, Haenle said. Biden's bid to best Xi Jinping as COP27's climate action hero President JOE BIDEN will unveil initiatives on Friday at the United Nations' COP27 climate talks in Egypt aimed to demonstrate that the world's second biggest current emitter of greenhouse gasses is stepping up to address the climate crisis. And the decision by China — the world's biggest current emitter of greenhouse gasses — to refuse to restore U.S.-China climate cooperation that Beijing suspended in August as a reprisal for House Speaker NANCY PELOSI's Taiwan visit is an implicit centerpiece of that effort. Biden's climate envoy, JOHN KERRY, said Tuesday that he had met at COP with his Chinese counterpart, XIE ZHENHUA, but there was no hint of a resumption in that cooperation. Biden's audience: the leaders of developing countries who have been targets of a multi-year Chinese climate diplomacy effort that Beijing has wielded as part of its toolkit to displace U.S. influence from Africa to the South Pacific. It's a Biden charm offensive at a time when U.S. efforts for substantive global climate action are stymied by a Chinese government that sees very little reason to collaborate, given tension over Taiwan, trade and human rights, as I reported this week.  And the propaganda apparatus of Chinese paramount leader XI JINPING — who's skipping COP27 — is helping Biden. "China-U.S. climate cooperation cannot be separated from the broad climate of bilateral ties … the United States side must take responsibility for this," a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson said last week . That messaging didn't go down well at COP among representatives of the Organization of Small Island States, who are seeking funding to pay for damage wrought by climate change. "We all know that the People's Republic of China, India — they're major polluters, and the polluter must pay," said the Prime Minister of Antigua and Barbuda, GASTON BROWNE, on Tuesday. That kicked Beijing into damage control mode . "We strongly support the claims from developing countries," China's climate envoy, Xie, said Wednesday, but added that "it is not the obligation of China" to provide such support. Meanwhile Biden is likely bringing cash to fund mitigation and adaptation initiatives in developing countries hardest hit by a rapidly warming world. Photo courtesy of Katherine Swidan Unjustly Detained U.S. Citizen Hits 10-Year Mark Behind Bars Texas resident Mark Swidan arrived in China in the autumn of 2012 for a short business trip.On Saturday he'll observe his tenth year as one of three Americans imprisoned in China, including Kai Li and David Lin , who the State Department's office of the special presidential envoy on hostage affairs designates as "wrongful detainees." Authorities have denied Swidan in-person visits from U.S. consular officials for more than a year citing the country's zero-Covid strategy. Swidan's " wrongful detainee " designation authorizes ROGER D. CARSTENS, the special envoy, to seek their release. But family members and prisoner release advocates say Carstens is hitting a brick wall in Beijing and that Swidan is suffering serious health problems caused by his imprisonment. The State Department says it's doing its best. Secretary of State ANTONY BLINKEN "affirmed that he is personally focused on and prioritizes bringing home U.S. nationals wrongfully detained in the PRC," the State Department said in a statement. Swidan's plight reflects the perils of the Chinese judicial system. Chinese police arrested him in November 2012 for allegedly manufacturing and trafficking narcotics, despite what nonprofit prisoner release advocacy organization Dui Hua Foundation has described as an absence of substantive evidence. After a 5 and a half year trial, a court in Guangdong province sentenced Swidan to death with a two-year reprieve in January 2020. He has refused to confess to any crime despite the fact that confessions can render sentence reductions and is appealing his conviction. "I don't know what will happen to Mark at this point — I pray a lot that his suffering will stop," Katherine Swidan, Mark's mother, told China Watcher. The Chinese government denies any irregularities in Swidan's case. "All legal rights of Mark Swidan have been fully guaranteed," Chinese embassy spokesperson LIU PENGYU said in a statement. National security adviser JAKE SULLIVAN told China's top diplomat, YANG JIECHI, in a June 13 meeting that releasing Americans wrongfully detained or subject to exit bans is a " personal priority " for both himself and Biden, a senior administration official said. The White House didn't respond to a request for comment. One of Swidan's congressional representatives, Sen. TED CRUZ (R-Texas) is working on a bipartisan resolution with Rep. MICHAEL CLOUD (R-Texas) in support of Swidan's release. A Cruz spokesperson said the resolution, which they aim to introduce when the Senate reconvenes, is about building momentum behind efforts to get Swidan home. TRANSLATING WASHINGTON — BIDEN CONFIRMS XI MEETING AT G-20:  President Biden confirmed on Wednesday that he will meet with Chinese President Xi on the sidelines of the G-20 meeting in Bali, Indonesia next week. Biden pledged that he's "not willing to make any fundamental concessions" to improve fractious U.S.-China ties when he meets Xi. "What I want to do with him when we talk is lay out … what each of our red lines are, understand what he believes to be in the critical national interests of China, what I know to be the critical interests of the United States, and to determine whether or not they conflict with one another. And if they do, how to resolve it and how to work it out," Biden told reporters at a briefing . — BIDEN EXTENDS CHINA THREAT 'NATIONAL EMERGENCY': President Biden indefinitely extended a "national emergency" declaration on Tuesday targeting the role of civilian Chinese companies in China's military industrial complex. That relationship "continues to constitute an unusual and extraordinary threat…to the national security, foreign policy, and economy of the United States," Biden said in a notification letter to House Speaker Pelosi and Vice President KAMALA HARRIS. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson ZHAO LIJIAN on Wednesday called the extension "a wanton denial of fact and the actual situation of relevant companies." — MCCARTHY TARGETS CHINA OVER FENTANYL CRISIS: House Minority leader KEVIN MCCARTHY (R-Calif.) has vowed stern action against the Chinese government for China-sourced chemicals fueling the U.S. opioid overdose epidemic. A Republican victory in the House of Representatives in Tuesday's midterms would prompt the GOP to launch "a very frontal attack on China to stop the poison from coming," McCarthy told CNN on Sunday . McCarthy didn't elaborate on what that action would entail. The bulk of the illegal synthetic opioids that reach the U.S. come from China via Mexico's Sinaloa and Jalisco New Generation cartels. They buy from legitimate and illicit Chinese suppliers through "purchases made on the open market, smuggling chemicals hidden in legitimate commercial shipments," the 2020 DEA National Drug Threat Assessment noted. The Chinese government has denied those allegations and suspended bilateral cooperation on counternarcotics in August in reprisal for House Speaker NANCY PELOSI's Taiwan visit. Hot from the China Watchersphere Twitter — LITHUANIA OPENS TAIWAN TRADE OFFICE: The Lithuanian government opened its trade office — an unofficial embassy — in Taiwan on Monday despite withering criticism from Beijing. The launch follows 15 months of economic coercion by Beijing in reprisal for Lithuania allowing Taiwan to open a representative office in Lithuania's capital, Vilnius, that included "Taiwanese" in the title rather than "Taipei." Zhao at the Foreign Ministry responded on Tuesday by urging Lithuania to "strictly abide by the One-China principle." — TRUDEAU SLAMS CHINA'S 'AGGRESSIVE' ELECTION MEDDLING: Canadian Prime Minister JUSTIN TRUDEAU lashed out at the Chinese government Over allegations that it had sought to undermine the integrity of the 2019 Canadian election. "State actors from around the world, whether it's China or others, are continuing to play aggressive games with our institutions, with our democracies," Trudeau said Monday . The Chinese Foreign Ministry's Zhao urged Trudeau on Tuesday to "stop making remarks that would harm bilateral relations." TRANSLATING CHINA Twitter — Xi JINPING ECONOMICS DECODED: Xi Jinping gave one of his favorite buzz phrases pride of place in his work report speech at the ruling Chinese Communist Party's 20th Party Congress last month. He pledged that his third term as China's paramount leader would focus on "achieving common prosperity." It's a vague phrase that refers more to a political stance than to specific issues like China's imploding property sector , the impact of Xi's zero-Covid policy or the economic impact of the Biden administration's imposition of export restrictions on semiconductors essential to the development of China's high tech sector. "This is more ideology than a belief that this is good for the economy," said ALICIA GARCÍA HERRERO, senior fellow at the European think tank BRUEGEL. Here's your cheat sheet to common prosperity — one of the two planks of what The Economist calls "Xinomics" — and how the government is implementing it. Common Prosperity: Xi introduced common prosperity in August 2021 as a vaguely defined redistributive economic program designed to "increase the income of the low-income group and expand the middle-income group." Xi fused it to the ruling Chinese Communist Party's policy agenda last month by adding the wording "gradually achieving common prosperity for all" to the CCP's constitution at last month's 20th Party Congress. In practice it has spawned an anti-inequality campaign compelling China's wealthiest to " give back to society more ." That has stalled the country's tech sector's growth as Chinese tech megafirms such as Tencent and Alibaba have donated billions of dollars to common prosperity initiatives to demonstrate corporate submission to Xi's economic agenda. The Chinese government has noted the negative optics of that campaign and is now marketing common prosperity as a benign form of wealth redistribution. "Common prosperity does not mean robbing from the rich and assisting the poor," said LIU PENGYU, spokesperson at the Chinese embassy in Beijing. "This is the process of getting rich and then helping others to get rich." Experts on China's economy are unimpressed. "What [common prosperity] lacks so far is any coherent economic program that actually would have a material effect on people's well-being," said GEORGE MAGNUS, associate at Oxford University's China Centre. "No sort of public housing programs, no wage redistribution, no tax reform — not really anything you can cite as an example of how greater equality is to be brought about." HEADLINES The Atlantic: " Taiwan Prepares to be Invaded " CNBC: " The U.S. and China should not miss a historic opportunity to save the world " Spiegel International: " Beijing's Long Arm: China's Secret Police Stations in Europe " HEADS UP  —ASEAN SUMMIT: BIDEN FIST BUMP FORECAST: The price of Biden's pursuit of closer ASEAN ties at the annual U.S.-ASEAN Summit and the East Asia Summit on Nov. 10-13 in Phnom Penh, Cambodia includes photo ops with some of the region's more odious despots. Starting with the summit host, Cambodian Prime Minister HUN SEN , along with Laotian President THONGLOUN SISOULITH and the Sultan of Brunei . Biden signalled distate for Saudi Crown Prince MOHAMMED BIN SALMAN — linked to his alleged role in the murder of the Washington Post journalist JAMAL KASHOGI in 2018 — by greeting MBS with a fist bump rather than a handshake. Will Biden give ASEAN authoritarians the same treatment ? Stay tuned. One Book, Three Questions Steve Leard for Polity Books The Book: China Goes Green: Coercive Environmentalism for a Troubled Planet The Authors:  YIFEI LI and JANET SHAPIRO; Li is an assistant professor of Environmental Studies at NYU Shanghai; and Shapiro is director of the Masters in Natural Resources and Sustainable Development in the School of International Service at American University.  Responses have been edited for length and clarity. What is the most important takeaway from your book? Despite China's discourses about ecological civilization, circular economy and a zero-carbon future, many of the tools and techniques the party-state is using to achieve environmental goals also further the control of citizens and shrink the space for non-state actors. But the effectiveness of state-led environmental governance depends not on a strong state but on mechanisms that put state power in check. What was the most surprising thing you learned while researching and writing this book?  Carbon cap-and-trade mechanisms grant the state unprecedented access to information about private businesses and citizens. What does your book tell us about the trajectory and future of U.S.-China relations?   Climate change is an arena of last resort for China and the U.S. to find common ground. Meaningful bilateral collaboration must be based on an evidence-based understanding of the promises and risks of China's ways. Being knee-jerk critical of China is as unhelpful as the unthinking regurgitation of Chinese state propaganda, because neither amounts to an honest assessment of Chinese state authority.   Got a book to recommend? Tell me about it at pkine@politico.com. Correction: Last week's China Watcher misstated the duration of WANG HUNING'S position on the CCP Politburo Standing Committee Thanks to: Heidi Vogt, Matt Kaminski and digital producer Andrew Howard. Do you have tips? Chinese-language stories we might have missed? Would you like to contribute to China Watcher or comment on this week's items? Email us at chinawatcher@politico.com.   Follow us

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