Potential Presidential Candidate Rahm Emanuel Slams Trump Admin. Cuts To Higher Education Funding

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During a House CCP Committee hearing last week, Rep. Shontel Brown (D-OH) asked former Japan ambassador Rahm Emanuel about ways to protect consumers from China's coercion tactics.

Transcript

00:00Representative Brown. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have the honor of representing Ohio's 11th

00:06Congressional District, a district that has been defined by the grit of working families,

00:10the contributions of small businesses, and the promise of American manufacturing.

00:15I want to focus today's hearing on how Chinese Communist Party's economic tactics have very

00:20real impact on everyday Americans. For too long, China has taken advantage of our open markets

00:26while putting up walls around their own, using tools like export restrictions, retaliatory

00:31tariffs, and targeted boycotts. That might sound abstract in policy terms, but it hits closer

00:37to home than people realize. When China imposes rare earth mineral restrictions, it doesn't

00:44just pressure Fortune 500 companies. It ripples through U.S. supply chains, raising costs for

00:49factories in the Midwest and threatening jobs in places like Cleveland and throughout Northeast

00:54Ohio. When China blocks key components used in American auto manufacturing, it's not just

01:01trade policy. It's a family on the east side who can't afford to fix their car. It's a union

01:07worker furloughed without notice. It's a parent watching groceries and gas get more expensive

01:12while global tensions rise. Ambassador Emanuel, your testimony underscores how China is leveraging

01:18its dominance in rare earth processing to apply economic pressure globally. From your experience

01:24in Japan and your work-building alliances, how can the United States and its allies act

01:29quickly to shield workers and consumers from price shocks and supply chain disruptions stemming

01:34from China's coercion?

01:36Well, first of all, I want to thank Congresswoman for noting the type of work that goes on in

01:45your district and across. I say this also as the ranking member made note of the Ford plant,

01:52as I did, shutting down in Chicago. As mayor, I convinced Ford to bring a third shift there,

01:58about 1,200 workers, and then an additional couple thousand on supply side. To see them shutter

02:05the plant, it's not just shuttering a plant. That's right. It means workers going without,

02:11as you noted, without paychecks. In fact, little leagues and the community that's built around that

02:17plant and supporting all the other activities that go on, they all come to a screeching halt.

02:24Not only did we talk extensively earlier about alliances working on an anti-coercion kind of coalition,

02:36but I also think knowing how to invest in our own strengths. I do happen to think the alliances and

02:42allies we've built up since World War II is a strength. We'll have our disagreements like every

02:47family does, but at the end of the day, we share more in common than the disagreements and the highlights

02:52of those. I think the United States has an incredible capacity, both in our research, our innovation,

03:01our technology, and our ability to take risks. That is a strength. Abandoning any one of those

03:09is unilateral disarmament. The universities in Ohio, while they're competitors to the University of

03:16Illinois or University of Michigan or any other statewide universities, is the envy of the world.

03:22The technology that comes from Ann Arbor, the technology that comes out of Columbus, Ohio,

03:28the technology that comes out of Champaign, Illinois, like the internet, the envy of the world.

03:36You know, one of the opportunities I had by living overseas is you get to see America in a different

03:41light. I used to say lip service, you know, the innovation, the ecosystem. But guess what?

03:48It's not lip service. It's a shining example. So not just protecting ourselves, but our strength,

03:56China replicates, copies, cheats, economic espionage, and intellectual property theft.

04:04We out-innovate everybody to cut research and development dollars to our universities,

04:10to attack the ability for them to attract talent. I know this may be heresy right now. That is

04:17literally taking our strengths and making it a weakness, and it's wrong. And so that to me,

04:24when you look at your universities in your state, the amount of not only innovation,

04:29but the amount of startups that come from there, the next future in the sense of technology that

04:33comes from there, and companies that come from there, that's where America plays a home game.

04:38That's an away game for China. You want to play on our turf. Nothing to take away from the

04:45universities in Australia. Don't get upset. But we have something that every other country in the

04:53world is envious of. What goes on at our universities, what goes on at our companies,

05:01the people that come from around the world, to be part of that? Why would we cut off our nose to

05:09spite our face? That's a home game for us. Play on our turf. So that's how you respond.

05:14Thank you. So this is for either of you. Many industries in my district,

05:19steel chemicals and manufacturing, have been undercut for years by China's unfair trade practices,

05:26including dumping products below market value and subsidizing state-backed firms.

05:32How should Congress strengthen our enforcement of countervailing duties and anti-dumping measures

05:39in a way that not only holds China accountable, but also ensures timely relief for American workers

05:46and producers? Interestingly, one of the things that led to China imposing, the PRC government imposing

05:55their trade bans on Australia was that we had taken some anti-dumping decisions on

06:01steel, on railways and rail lines and so on. One of the conditions the new government agreed to in

06:09order to have all those trade bans dumped was to drop those anti-dumping decisions as well.

06:16And so anti-dumping, I think, is a real threat to China. And not just here in the United States or

06:22in Australia, but increasingly in developing economies all around the world. The number

06:26of anti-dumping inquiries and actions being taken by developing countries, because the PRC's economic

06:34model is based on overproduction. Their consumer economy is weak and they make up for it by driving

06:43overproduction at what is effectively at non-performing prices for their state-owned enterprises.

06:50They wear the losses. They dump the products. And this is starting to burn relationships between the PRC

06:57and what they would call their clients under the BRI program. So this is a weakness for the PRC.

07:04And so to highlight this overproduction, dumping of products, be here in the United States or elsewhere,

07:11and working together with allies and partners to back each other up on those measures, I think is

07:15really important. And having some harmony about how these things are investigated and rooted out,

07:21not only will that be beneficial here, but I think it will be welcomed in developing countries,

07:26which the PRC often uses and lists to try and achieve their own objectives, particularly in international

07:32institutions. And that's another area I'd highlight, the PRC's influence in international institutions.

07:39We talked about critical minerals and rare earths. And one of the increasing sources of that in the

07:44future will be from seabed. And the involvement of China seeking to gain seabed license mining in the

07:52southwest Pacific and others, and to crowd out allies and partners in that field, is a troubling issue,

07:58and one that the U.S. can play an important role in.

08:02I know, Mr. Chairman, we're on a short time here. There's an example right now on the magnets.

08:07There's a company in Australia, MP here in the United States. I think it's really important to

08:13underscore both your question and what the Prime Minister answered, which is China's attempt,

08:17will be right now, given what we're doing, will be to crush the price of magnets worldwide

08:23through subsidies, so that neither the Australian company or the American company can get their

08:28sea legs and be a stand-alone, capable company. Supporting both the price and the ability to

08:35withstand price competition, and that's not market-driven, but state-driven, is going to be essential to our

08:42future, not short-term, over the long-term decades, economic independence and sovereignty.

08:49I think it was two to three weeks ago, China banned all scientists who work at the magnet

08:58industry in China from traveling overseas. I don't think it was because they recommended that their

09:04holidays be sent only in China, because they knew that intellectual capability, and they're going

09:10around the world at the very time that Australia and the United States are starting to build up a

09:14magnet industry that is basically dormant to a stand-alone, is the thing that they don't want

09:20to see happen. So they can't go to conferences, they can't go to international gatherings.

09:25So sustaining those companies, reshoring, friendshoring, will make us economically independent of China's coercion.

09:34Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.

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