The Select: A Weekly Committee Recap
Welcome to The Select, a weekly newsletter on the work of the Congressional Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party led by Chairman John Moolenaar (R-MI).
See below for this week's updates.
'CCP Intentionally poisoning Americans' -Moolenaar joins Newsnation
Watch the Chairman's full News Nation interview HERE, and read key moments below:
Moolenaar on the Select Committee's new Fentanyl Working Group:
“President Xi Jinping met with President Biden last fall, and pledged cooperation to help America with its fentanyl problem. At the same time — his government was subsidizing, encouraging and making profits from this drug trade.
We have to recognize that this is an intentional poisoning of Americans, and we need it to stop. We’ve formed a working group to look at this entire process.”
'Chinese subsidies for drones, chips put U.S. at risk, House panel says in hearing' - Washington Post
Chairman Moolenaar and Select Committee members hosted a hearing titled, 'From High Tech to Heavy Steel: Combatting the PRC's Strategy to Dominate Semiconductors, Shipbuilding and Drones."
Witnesses included Mr. Adam Bry, Founder and Chief Executive Officer, Skydio, Dr. Chris Miller, Professor at Fletcher School at Tufts University, Nonresident Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and Mr. Scott Paul, President, Alliance for American Manufacturing.
Chairman John Moolenaar:
“What our witnesses have just attested to is the CCP’s go-to strategy: Building government subsidized monopolies… then dumping overcapacity on global markets to tank prices and drive competitors out of the market, all in the service of the CCP’s interest.”
Click HERE for Chairman Moolenaar's opening remarks as prepared for delivery.
Ranking Member Raja Krishnamoorthi:
“In 1975, we were the world’s number one shipbuilder. Now, we don’t even produce one percent of the world’s large oceangoing vessels. For every 359 large container ships China builds, we are building one.”
Fentanyl & Critical Mineral Working Groups Debut
The Fentanyl Working Group, led by Rep. Dan Newhouse (R-WA) and Rep. Jake Auchincloss (D-MA), heard from Mr. Ray Donovan, former Chief of Operations of the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) and Mr. Bill Evanina, former Director of the National Counterintelligence and Security Center. In the roundtable-style event, the experts and members built on the Select Committee's April report on the CCP's role in the fentanyl crisis to discuss the current gaps in the US response and how America should respond in the future.
In his remarks as prepared for delivery, Rep. Newhouse said, "We are all in agreement that too many Americans have died for us to waste time on political theater. On this issue, there are no Republicans or Democrats. We must face this particularly disturbing aspect of the CCP threat together as Americans."
Click HERE to read Rep. Newhouse's prepared opening remarks.
Read more about the mission of the Fentanyl Policy Working Group HERE.
The Critical Minerals Policy Working Group, led by Rep. Rob Wittman (R-VA) and Rep. Kathy Castor (D-FL), heard from critical minerals experts to discuss the importance of battery materials and rare earth magnets in national security and advanced technologies, highlighting current dependencies on foreign production chains, particularly from China. The meeting explored strategies to strengthen domestic production, diversify supply chains, and enhance the resilience and sustainability of the rare earth magnet industry in the United States.
In his remarks as prepared for delivery, Rep. Rob Wittman said, "For decades, PRC policies have aimed to concentrate rare earth elements (REE) and critical mineral supply chains in China. Export quotas and value added tax incentives on rare earth elements, vertical integration of mining and production by state-owned companies, and investment restrictions prohibiting foreign companies from extracting or refining rare earth elements in the PRC contributed to this control...It is clear the PRC is eager to leverage the choke points it developed in this critical sector to harm the national security of the United States."
Click HERE to read Rep. Wittman's prepared opening remarks.
Read more about the mission of the Critical Minerals Policy Working Group HERE.
Moolenaar, Krishnamoorthi Statement Following Gold-Medalist Michael Phelps' Testimony
Chairman John Moolenaar (R-MI) and Ranking Member Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-IL) of the House Select Committee on the Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party released the below statement following the testimony of Olympians at the House Energy and Commerce Committee yesterday evening on PRC doping in the 2021 Olympic games.
"The recent New York Times reporting and the compelling testimony of Michael Phelps, Allison Schmitt, and Travis Tygart at the Energy and Commerce Committee yesterday raises further questions about the actions of the China Anti-Doping Agency and its complicity in the alleged doping practices of PRC athletes. This sort of behavior cannot be tolerated by the international athletic community. As our inquiry into these practices continues, the Select Committee looks forward to the Justice Department’s briefing and investigation into this matter. Amid this controversy, we celebrate the American athletes who are competing cleanly, with integrity, and in the spirit of the Olympic games.”
Millions in Taxpayer Cash Awarded to Subsidiary of Sanctioned CCP 'Military Company'
From the Washington Free Beacon:
The federal government awarded $2.6 million in taxpayer cash to a biotech company controlled by a Chinese firm that is sanctioned by the American government and designated as a CCP "military company," spending records show.
From 2011 to 2024, the U.S. government awarded $2.6 million over 151 separate transactions to Innomics, a Massachusetts-based subsidiary of the Beijing Genomics Institute (BGI) Group, a Chinese gene harvesting powerhouse that the Pentagon lists as a "Communist Chinese military company" for its alleged role in supporting Beijing’s ongoing genocide against the Uyghur ethnic minority.
Several of BGI’s affiliates are listed on U.S. government trade blacklists for allegedly fueling the Communist regime’s mass surveillance of citizens. Watchdog groups have also raised concerns that Chinese genome companies like BGI are amassing large quantities of private American health care data via their U.S. affiliates.
Innomics was identified by the Wall Street Journal in May as one of several "blacklisted Chinese companies" that rebranded in recent years to avoid a regulatory crackdown in the United States.
A spokesman for Republican leaders on the House China Committee said it is "well-documented that BGI and its subsidiaries collect genomic sequencing from around the world to share with the Chinese government for malign purposes. The Pentagon has rightfully blacklisted BGI as a Chinese military company." Innomics, the spokesman added, "is just the latest attempt by BGI to disguise its subsidiaries to continue its collection operations in the United States."
Read the full article in the Washington Free Beacon HERE.