Four Republican senators on the Foreign Relations committee introduced a new bill Wednesday that would put forth a strategy for how the U.S. should compete with China on the world stage, including in the critical area of technology innovation, according to a press release. Democrats said they have a similar bill of their own on the way, too.
Sens. Jim Risch, R-Idaho, Cory Gardner, R-Colo., Mitt Romney, R-Utah, and Todd Young, R-Ind., announced the Strengthening Trade, Regional Alliances, Technology, and Economic and Geopolitical Initiatives Concerning China, or STRATEGIC, Act ahead of a Foreign Relations committee hearing on advancing effective competition with China. Risch is the chairman of the committee.
“It’s not enough to just push back against what China’s doing,” Risch said in his opening statement at Wednesday’s hearing. “We also have to strengthen and invest in ourselves.”
Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., the top Democrat on the Foreign Relations committee, said that he is currently working on similar legislation to be released soon. Both Menendez and Risch emphasized the room for agreement across party lines on the issue of competition with China.
At the hearing, Romney criticized both the current and past administrations’ policies toward China during the hearing. He particularly excoriated President Donald Trump’s “America First” policy and Brexit as indicative of the fact that the international community has not done a good enough job working together to counter China’s influence.
“America looks like we don’t care about bringing the world together in a dramatic way,” Romney said. “I would suggest a summit of the leaders of the major nations of the world and layin ..
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