U.S. Senator Tommy Tuberville last week announced a bipartisan plan to block Chinese companies from owning American cryptocurrency companies. In an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal, Tuberville announced a bipartisan bill, with U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-New York), to amend the Commodity Exchange Act to prohibit entities organized or established in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) or a subsidiary of such an entity from acquiring a U.S. digital asset broker, dealer, custodian, or exchange.
“This bipartisan bill will help to wall off the burgeoning American digital commodity industry from CCP interference and preserve our data privacy and investor protection rights,” wrote Senator Tuberville. “It will also help ensure that America continues to lead in financial innovation, which is essential to maintaining America’s position in the world.”
The bill would prohibit the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) from registering a digital commodity platform owned in whole or in part by an entity organized or established in the PRC. It also requires the CFTC to revoke the registration of any digital commodity platform if an entity with ties to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) acquires all or any part of the ownership of the entity.
Tuberville and Gillibrand say they are concerned because digital commodity platforms collect and store their users’ personally identifiable information — including Social Security numbers, mailing addresses, and sensitive financial account data. They claim that allowing entities based in the PRC to access this information raises serious concerns about investor protection, data privacy, national security, sanctions compliance, and anti-money laundering efforts. They also expressed concerns that companies based in the PRC all ultimately answer to the CCP.
On Monday, Senator Tuberville sent an oversight letter to both the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA), objecting to those agencies’ approval of a Chinese-connected crypto securities broker-dealer, Prometheum Ember Capital, LLC. In May, Senator Tuberville sent a similar letter to financial regulators asking for details surrounding Chinese-linked stock trading platforms operating in the U.S.
Under current law, U.S. regulators have limited tools to block the purchase of a U.S. digital commodity platform by a CCP-tied entity. Tuberville and Gillibrand say that their bipartisan bill will help to shield the burgeoning U.S. digital asset industry from Chinese interference and help to ensure continued American leadership in financial innovation.
Investors in crypto-currencies lost over $2 trillion last year, highlighting how speculative and risky those alternative investments actually are.
Sen. Tuberville is also leading the call for an investigation into Webull Financial, LLC and Moomoo, Inc. — two Chinese-owned stock trading apps operating in the United States that are registered with the SEC and FINRA. Both apps are widely used by American investors and freely collect and store sensitive information about users, including Social Security numbers, mailing addresses, and financial account data. In May 2023, Senator Tuberville sent a letter to SEC Chair Gary Gensler and FINRA President and CEO Robert Cook calling for oversight of the trading platforms due to the potential CCP access of American user data. In the letter, Senator Tuberville expressed concerns about the ability of the SEC and FINRA to examine the Chinese companies’ compliance with U.S. law.
Tuberville’s concerns about China are not limited to just financial markets. In March, Senator Tuberville led a congressional delegation to Panama to discuss countering China’s growing influence in the region. On the trip, Senator Tuberville met with American and Panamanian officials to strategize ways to combat Chinese attempts to control the Panama Canal, which would give China enormous influence over global supply chains. The United States built the Panama Canal in the early part of the 20th century. In the 1970s then-President Jimmy Carter transferred it back to Panama. The Panamanians, with Chinese technical assistance and capital, have since widened and modernized the canal.
Tuberville has also introduced legislation to ban members of the CCP from receiving B-1 and B-2 visas to the United States for vacation and non-official government business, citing the CCP’s responsibility for trillions of dollars of intellectual property theft each year. The bill cosponsored by Senator Tuberville would bar all 93 million CCP members from entering the United States using nonimmigrant B-1 and B-2 visas.
Tuberville has expressed concerns about the retirement savings of our military and federal government employees, known as the Thrift Savings Plan (TSP) being invested in the economies of our adversaries like China. Tuberville previously wrote about this issue in the Wall Street Journal in a column entitled, “I’ll Keep Veterans’ Pensions Safe From Communism.” To that end, Tuberville has pushed for accountability from the Federal Retirement Thrift Investment Board (FRTIB) surrounding the board’s policy on foreign investments. Tuberville has even placed a hold on nominees to the FRTIB until the nominees provided clarification regarding foreign investment policies, which forced the nominees to commit to opposing TSP investment in China.
Tommy Tuberville was elected to the U.S. Senate in 2020 following decades as an educator, football coach, and sports broadcaster.
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