Political Quotes

“I thank the ranking member for yielding. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of this legislation which is urgently needed. Our adversaries and competitors are indeed actively exploiting gaps in our existing CFIUS process, which I would argue has not been materially modernized in 30 years, and there are gaps. Right now, purchases of land near our most sensitive national security installations which are purchased to facilitate espionage go unreviewed unless there happens to be an existing business on that site. Investments that could give our strategic competitors influence and insights into our critical technology or the critical infrastructure our country relies on go unreviewed because they fall just short of control of a company. Rights changes that can confer control of a company even without new equity being contributed are not clearly within CFIUS jurisdiction. There is a gap between CFIUS' existing authority over joint ventures involving a whole U.S. business and the export control system's authority over individual pieces of technology and know-how. Good news. We close these gaps in this bill. I appreciate deeply the willingness of Chairmen Hensarling and Barr to work to ensure this legislation effectively addresses investments that could expose details of critical technology or critical infrastructure to our strategic competitors and to incorporate other improvements suggested by our national security committees.…”