Chinese State Media Resort to Personal Attacks on New US House Speaker

Commentary

As many China watchers know, the relentless propaganda narratives conveyed by state-run Chinese media outlets—such as People’s Daily, China Daily, and Xinhua—are almost invariably the opposite of the truth. Thus, when Chinese media vehemently condemn an action taken by the U.S. Congress in particular, the reality is that the Americans are over their target for a change and should continue all actions. That target, of course, is the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

In this case, the Chinese communist ire has been directed toward the bipartisan establishment of the “Select Committee on the Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party” by the new Republican-controlled House of Representatives. And that means that the new select committee is exactly the right course of action to monitor and counteract CCP activities inimical to the interests of the American people.

Consider the Chinese regime’s actions in recent years that demand an aggressive response by the United States: massive theft of U.S. intellectual property, thorough penetration of U.S. academia (including the scandal breaking at the University of Pennsylvania’s Biden Center), exposure of Democrat staffers in Congress with CCP ties, relentless Chinese spying in the United States, the decades-long offshoring of U.S. manufacturing to China, People’s Liberation Army (PLA) belligerence on the high seas, sourcing of fentanyl and its precursor chemicals from China, direct ideological and financial support for Black Lives Matter, increasing dependence on Chinese supply chains that highlight U.S. national security vulnerabilities, etc.

It is a wonder that this committee wasn’t established years ago!

Is ire (that is, an “intense and usually openly displayed anger”) too strong a word in characterizing the Chinese state-run media’s response to the new select committee? Here are some choice excerpts from a Global Times diatribe on Jan. 12:

• “This is a fire that Kevin McCarthy … set on China.
• “Various committees, offices, or groups targeting China have almost become corny in Washington. They are basically created to cater to the anxiety and even fear in the United States toward China’s rapid development.
• “The committee will definitely try every means to make trouble out of nothing, magnify small matters, and seek every opportunity to create noise in China-US relations.”

But the Chinese tabloid’s ultimate vitriol was directed personally at the new speaker of the House, Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), whom they castigate as the “second coming” of former Sen. Joe McCarthy (R-Wis.). The latter was chairman of the Senate Committee on Government Operations in the 1950s, which investigated and rooted out communists in the U.S. government and other American institutions.

From Global Times: “The name ‘McCarthy’ represents a segment of Washington’s ugly history, a sinister wind of the Cold War. … The two share the same surname, but they are also highly similar in terms of discourse style, political posture, anti-communist logic, and ideological color.”

But the communists get the comparison dead wrong—as do most American leftists these days. Although censured for his excesses in intimidating witnesses before his committee, “McCarthy actually underestimated the number of American Soviet spies working for the USSR in the FDR administration,” according to Newsmax. Scholarly analysis of the Venona papers (decrypted Soviet diplomatic cables) has revealed over 500 known Soviet spies, whereas McCarthy predicted 205 existed at the time of his committee hearings. And that number doesn’t account for Chinese communist spies and fellow travelers inside and outside the U.S. government over the years. In short, “Bomber Joe” McCarthy was right, and his critics were wrong about the deep penetration of the U.S. government by communist spies. Indeed, how many Chinese communist spies are still operational within the federal bureaucracy and other American institutions in 2023?

The vote in favor of the new committee was 365–65, with only left-wing fringes like The Squad and others in the Progressive Caucus voting against its establishment, despite the ongoing hybrid war being conducted in broad daylight by the CCP against the United States for years (as noted here, here, and here). Did the 65 who voted no somehow “forget” their oaths of office, which includes the clause, “I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic”? For if the Chinese Communist Party is not a foreign enemy of the United States and its Constitution, then none such exists! Perhaps one of the first tasks of the new committee should be to investigate the bank accounts of the 65 to ascertain whether there are any CCP connections.

The significant bipartisan support for the committee undoubtedly shocked the communists, who have invested much in elite capture in the United States, including the Biden family, as noted by Scott Powell of the Discovery Institute in November 2022, and who probably expected a better return on their investment—or at least more debate in the House and more pro-China editorials in the legacy media.

To personally and publicly attack Kevin McCarthy during his first week as the new U.S. speaker of the House was perhaps a blunder on the part of the CCP. If anything, McCarthy will have been hardened by the insults.

Did the CCP expect that its supporters in the Democrat media complex would pile on and castigate McCarthy for the establishment of the new select committee? Certainly, some tried to play the “racist card” by inferring that the new committee would elevate racial tensions with Asian Americans. Rep. Judy Chu (D-Calif.), chairman of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus and a “no vote,” dutifully reminded committee members “that this committee should not be used as an open invitation to traffic in blatant xenophobic, anti-China rhetoric we know results in physical violence against Asian Americans,” according to CNSNews.

But it should be noted that the committee is properly directed at the Chinese Communist Party by its very name, not at the long-beleaguered and persecuted Chinese people with whom most Americans make common cause.

Concluding Thoughts

Americans are watching new House Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s actions very closely. Will he or won’t he adhere to the agreements made with House conservatives that led to his election as speaker? That one of his first actions involved the establishment of the “Select Committee on the Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party” is an excellent first step in the right direction. And that the Chinese state-run media are apoplectic about it and have resorted to personal attacks against the new House speaker is a good sign for the United States.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.