Mike Levin: “Mr. Speaker, this is not going to be the last time that we debate our economic and trade relations with China. I hope…”

“Mr. Speaker, this is not going to be the last time that we debate our economic and trade relations with China. I hope not at all. Indeed, China PNTR as it passed the House has been molded so that we will be assured of continuing surveillance, continuing oversight, continuing pressure, and continuing debate. The whole purpose of that effort as we shaped and reshaped it was to make sure that we both engaged China and confronted it in terms of our economic and trade relations. As a result, as we have discussed, and I do not want to go into this in detail, we set up a commission that has major responsibilities, that is created at the highest level and that has jurisdiction in terms of human rights, including worker rights. That commission is going to report back to this Congress with provisions written in to assure that we will be discussing and debating it. Indeed, I see these mechanisms, these instrumentalities as ways to assure our greater involvement, not our lessened involvement, our deeper engagement on a regular basis rather than the once-a-year consideration.”