GOP Sen. Braun: Lessen Economic Dependency on China or ‘When They Decide to Pivot, It’ll Be Painful’

On Friday’s broadcast of the Fox Business Network’s “Mornings with Maria,” Sen. Mike Braun (R-IN) said that people are looking to move out of Russia because they can’t be trusted and should do the same with China, or when China pivots, “it’ll be painful for us if we don’t withdraw gradually.”

Braun responded [relevant remarks begin around 4:35] to Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) calling for decoupling from China’s economy the same way we’re decoupling from Russia’s economy by stating, “Couldn’t agree with Tom more. They’re playing chess and Xi is the one moving it around on the board. Russia, to them, is probably a source of fuel in the future and the commonality is authoritarian governments.”

He continued, “And you can see what China’s been doing, it’s been stealing our intellectual property, manipulating markets. We’ve gotten lured, through big corporations, to tap into their consumer market, moving a lot of our supply chain there, got to be careful. They are in it for the long run, and when they decide to pivot, it’ll be painful for us if we don’t withdraw gradually. I know in the business that I ran for 37 years, that dependency on China, if you’ve got it, is a rough thing to have. We were lucky that we never had that much involvement there. But everybody is looking to move a supply chain out of a place that you can’t trust with a handshake. You can now see Putin, Xi, any of these places where you’re dependent, lessen that dependency over time or you’re going to pay the price if you don’t.”

Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett