Walmart, Target Feign Concern over Chinese Involvement in Economy Despite Extensive Business Ties to the Country

The US flag flies over Chinese shipping containers that were unloaded at the Port of Long
MARK RALSTON/AFP/Getty Images
Spencer Lindquist

The Merchants Payment Coalition (MPC) wrote a letter posturing against China despite Walmart and Target, leading firms in the coalition, having extensive business ties to the country.

“MPC has grave concerns over the level of involvement that China has in our nation’s payments system,” the letter to Rep. Maxine Waters and Rep. Patrick McHenry sets out.

The letter urges the Congressmen to pass Senator Dick Durbin’s “Credit Card Competition Act,” which opponents say would “eviscerate the $60 billion in annual value” consumers acquire through credit card benefits, which often include rewards points for travel and hotels among other perks. 

In the letter, MPC outlined their concerns with Chinese involvement in the governing board of the Payments Card Industry Security Standards Council. “The level of involvement that China has in our nation’s payments system underscores the importance of enactment of the Credit Card Competition Act,” the letter also reads.

It also states, “The legislation strengthens U.S. payments by ensuring that networks operated by entities such as China cannot operate within our borders.” MPC’s letter concluded by remarking “Thank you again for your commitment to combating threats to our economic security from China and we appreciate your consideration of this letter.” 

But while the coalition contended that the legislation “strengthens U.S. payments by ensuring that networks operated by entities such as China cannot operate within our borders,” Walmart and Target, the leading firms in the coalition, are doing big business in China. 

Walmart, for example, operates 390 stores in over 100 cities in China with plans to expand. Meanwhile, Target imports 34 percent of its products from China while Walmart imports 26 percent of its products from the country. 

Both companies lobbied against Trump’s tariffs on China in 2019 with a letter that claimed “Broadly applied tariffs are not an effective tool to change China’s unfair trade practices.”

One Senate advisor told Breitbart News, “The woke mega-retailers do business with China, but are now citing China as a reason to pass Dick Durbin’s price cap bill. This is the height of hypocrisy.”

The companies have also advanced leftist social beliefs, with Walmart creating a Critical Race Theory training program for their employees that condemned the United States as a “white supremacy system.” The program also condemned white employees, claiming that they are guilty of “white supremacy thinking” as well as “internalized racial superiority.” 

Meanwhile, Target prevented the sale of Abigail Shrier’s book Irreversible Damage, which critiqued the rise of transgenderism among young girls.

Spencer Lindquist is a reporter for Breitbart News. Follow him on Twitter @SpencerLndqst and reach out at slindquist@breitbart.com.

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