Congress releases comprehensive plan to combat China’s growing economic aggression: Strategy to ‘send a message’ to Beijing includes slapping on heavier tariffs and exposing U.S. companies’ ties to the hostile nation

Congress is stepping up its efforts to counter growing Chinese “economic aggression” by calling on the US to sever additional financial ties to the communist regime.

The House Select Committee on Chinese Communist Party Affairs released a comprehensive report Tuesday morning outlining numerous challenges facing the United States and its allies from China.

“This is a plan not only for how we can reduce risks from China, but also for how we can boost the American economy for decades to come,” Chairman Mike Gallagher, a Wisconsin Republican, told DailyMail.com in a phone call. “The status quo is not working.”

The 53-page, bipartisan report makes a series of more than 150 recommendations for the United States to most effectively counter China and shift away from dependence on a hostile country. It is intended as a blueprint for legislative fixes that could win support from Republicans and Democrats over the next few months.

The first of the three “pillars” is to “reset the terms” of US economic relations with the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and “recognize the serious risks of economic reliance on a strategic competitor.”

President Joe Biden met with Chinese President Xi Jinping at the APEC summit in San Francisco last month.

Chairman Mike Gallagher, R-Wis., and ranking Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, D-Ill., attend a meeting of the Select Committee on Strategic Competition between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party.

The lawmakers write that both the government and the private sector “can no longer ignore the systemic risks associated” with doing business in China.

Their recommendation is to introduce new tariffs in a “relatively short period of time” to give the U.S. economy time to adjust.

The proposed tariffs would be imposed on new products including smartphones and toys, in addition to increasing previous taxes.

Lawmakers argue that when China joined the World Trade Organization in 2001, the expected economic benefits fell short.

Second, the report says the US must immediately stop the “technology and capital” that are fueling China’s military modernization and human rights abuses.

Their recommendations focus on ways the US can “create transparency” about US companies investing in China and disclose the “key risks” associated with them.

Specifically, “to ensure transparency for investors,” annual disclosure requirements must include details of “material ties to the CCP” and profits.

The Treasury Department would also be required to provide “monthly reports” on the holdings of “citizenship-based foreign securities” in the U.S. portfolio, covering a sector for which the department does not currently collect data.

Third, the US must invest in itself to further separate itself from China and be able to fend for itself if Taiwan is invaded in the near future.

The strategy must be “proactive” so that the US can “strengthen economic and technological cooperation” with “like-minded partners” and allies.

All three pillars together must “level the economic playing field, reduce China’s influence on the critical supply chains of the United States and its allies, and invest in the future of continued economic and technological leadership of the United States and its like-minded partners,” he said. the report says.

Raja Krishnamurthy, an Illinois Republican who is the panel’s senior member, told DailyMail.com that the report is “the product of consensus.”

“It’s really important—I call it upping our game,” he added of the third pillar in particular, encouraging development and incentivizing the U.S. workforce.

Analysts said the report comes as Beijing’s military has intruded on more than 20 major suppliers in the past year alone, including a water utility in Hawaii, a major port on the West Coast and at least one oil and gas pipeline.

They bypassed sophisticated cybersecurity systems by intercepting passwords and logins not guarded by junior employees, leaving China “sitting on a stockpile of strategic” vulnerabilities.

The project, codenamed Volt-Typhoon, coincides with rising tensions over Taiwan and could undermine US efforts to protect its interests in the South China Sea.

“It is clear that China’s efforts to compromise critical infrastructure are, in part, intended to prepare to be able to disrupt or destroy that critical infrastructure in the event of conflict,” said Brandon Wales of the Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Division. Security Agency (CISA).

Hackers often cover their tracks by using unsuspicious devices such as home or office routers in an attempt to steal employee credentials, officials said.

Another issue that is on the radar of Congress is China’s infiltration of Guam, a major US military installation.

Analysts believe the Chinese military has changed its strategy from intelligence gathering to infiltration in an attempt to sow chaos if war breaks out.

China’s focus on Guam is particularly concerning because the U.S. territory is a key military base in the Pacific and could become a key staging ground for any U.S. response to conflict in Taiwan or the South China Sea.

In 2019, the Biden administration adopted a policy allowing Chinese citizens to visit the Northern Mariana Islands for 14 days without a visa. From there, many reportedly chartered boats to Guam to obtain information about secret US military installations.

Sen. Joni Ernst, speaking exclusively to DailyMail.com at the annual Reagan National Defense Forum in Simi Valley, California, earlier this month said the visa loophole allows spies a “closer look” at what the US is doing militarily in Guam and then “use it against us.”

“We are trying to close these loopholes. I just think it’s very, very important,” said Ernst, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee.