Marco Rubio a “No” Vote on China Bill Until Protections Included Against Intellectual Property Theft

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) said he is a “no” vote Thursday on a China bill because it does not protect against intellectual property theft.

“I support a real #China bill And a real China bill is one that has in place safeguards to prevent billions of dollars of research being stolen I will not vote to end debate on the China bill until those safeguards are in place,” he tweeted:

I support a real #China bill

And a real China bill is one that has in place safeguards to prevent billions of dollars of research being stolen

I will not vote to end debate on the China bill until those safeguards are in place

— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) May 27, 2021

Rubio spoke Monday to Breitbart News’s Matt Boyle about the bill in which he said the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) senses an “opportunity” with Democrat President Joe Biden in the White House regarding the legislation:

Rubio pointed to bipartisan legislation the U.S. Senate is considering this week called the Endless Frontier Act as an example of the United States being weak in the face of Chinese aggression. While he said it is “good” that senators from both parties are teaming up on the bill—which is designed to counter long-term efforts by the CCP to engage a number of industries and cutting edge fields of technology for its purposes by pumping more than $100 billion into U.S. research institutions—he is concerned that the bill does not have proper safeguards to prevent the research that would be done as a result of that funding from falling, again, into the hands of Chinese Communist Party officials.

“Here’s the problem,” he told Boyle of the bill, “The problem is it pours all this money into research and development. But as of today, and I hope that will change, it doesn’t have safeguards in place to keep that from being stolen.”