All governors should protect their state investments from non-transparent Chinese entities and the evil which they perpetrate on the Chinese people.
Fairfax, Va. – Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and some of his administration’s top officials moved this week to protect their state investments from non-transparent Chinese companies. Americans for Limited Government (ALG) President Richard Manning issued the following statement in support of Gov. DeSantis:
“Americans for Limited Government strongly supports Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’s choice to pursue divestment of his state’s pension funds from Chinese assets.
“Chinese assets are not suitable for any pension fund investment due to their lack of transparency and the resulting inability of honest pension fund managers to determine their viability. What’s more, Chinese corporations are interconnected with the Chinese Communist Party, which engages in a barely-muted cold war against the United States.
“Finally, and perhaps most important of all, Chinese corporations, and China as a whole, encourage the use of slave labor for the manufacturing of goods. The Department of Labor has long recognized Uyghur Muslims and other religious and ethnic minorities who have been forced into state-sponsored labor and re-education camps by the Chinese Communist Party in Xinjiang and elsewhere across China. The 2020 report published by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of International Labor Affairs lists China 17 times as using children and slaves to make goods, many of which find their place on the shelves of U.S. retailers like Walmart. Artificial flowers, bricks, Christmas decorations, coal, cotton, electronics, fireworks, fish, footwear, garments, gloves, hair products, nails, textiles, thread/yarn, tomato products, toys are all listed as being made with child or slave labor in China.
“The Department of Defense has also condemned the vast concentration camp system in China said to be housing up to 3 million Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang province alone. In 2019, Assistant Secretary of Defense for Asian and Pacific Security Affairs Randall Schriver told a Pentagon briefing, ‘The [Chinese] are using the security forces for mass imprisonment of Chinese Muslims in concentration camps,” justifying the use of the term because “given what we understand to be the magnitude of the detention, at least a million but likely closer to three million citizens out of a population of about 10 million.’”
“ALG urges every governor in the U.S. to follow Gov. DeSantis’s lead and protect their state investments from non-transparent Chinese entities and the evil which they perpetrate on the Chinese people and the world.”
Interview Availability: Please contact Americans for Limited Government at 703-478-4643 or at cmortensen@getliberty.org.