Pete Stark: “Mr. Speaker, no one will stand on this floor today to defend China's arms trafficking to terrorist nations, Iran, Iraq…”

“Mr. Speaker, no one will stand on this floor today to defend China's arms trafficking to terrorist nations, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Syria, America's enemies. But the apologists also say MFN is not a tool to stop illegal traffic and weapons of mass destruction. No one will stand on this floor today to defend the human rights atrocities of the Chinese regime. But the apologists will say MFN should not be used to defend human or labor rights. The apologists say MFN for China is just normal trade relations. How can you have normal trade relations with an outlaw regime? How can we have normal trade relations with the most unfair trading nation on Earth? The Chinese systematically exclude nonstrategic United States goods. First, there is a 23 percent tariff, on average. Then they have their discriminatory 17-percent value-added tax, which often only gets added to United States goods, not Chinese goods. Then, if that is not enough, they have nontariff barriers that make the Japanese nontariff barriers look like the work of amateurs. And finally, something might somehow get past that they have unwritten rules that change day-to-day, port-to-port in China to keep out anything that might get past those barriers. The bottom line is, the only United States goods allowed in are those that enrich China's corrupt leaders or add to their store of critical technology and military weaponry.”