US To End China’s Permanent Normal Trade Relations Status

According to media reports that senators Tom Cotton with his colleagues Ted Budd, Rick Scott, and J.D. Vance introduced the China Trade Relations Act on January 26 to strip China of its Permanent Normal Trade Relations (PNTR) status. This legislation would require China to obtain Most Favored Nation (MFN) status through annual presidential approval, per the requirements of the Jackson-Vanik Amendment. Congress could override the president’s extension of MFN by passing a joint resolution of disapproval. The bill would also expand the Jackson-Vanik Amendment to include human rights and trade abuses as disqualifying factors for MFN status, the abuses that would make Communist China ineligible for MFN status, absent a presidential waiver, are as follows: uses of slave labor; operates ‘vocational training and education centers or other concentration camps where people are held against their will; performs or otherwise orders forced abortion or sterilization procedures; harvests the organs of prisoners without their consent; hinders the free exercise of religion; intimidates or harasses Chinese nationals not living in China; Engages in systematic economic espionage against the United States, including intellectual property theft.” The bill demonstrates the escalation of U.S. actions to counter the malign influence of the Chinese Communist Party around the world. The United States finally realizes that the CCP is not a friend of this country. As Senator Scott said “The CCP cares about one thing: undermining America. There is no reason why the United States should be helping a Communist government’s trade operation through preferential treatment and ‘most-favored-nation’ status. That is absolutely absurd when they are working against us. It is time to put American interests first, not the CCP, and reverse this antiquated law.”