House China Committee: Cargo cranes give China a tool to disrupt trade, military mobilization at US ports

EXCLUSIVE: Chinese-made cargo cranes astatine large U.S. ports person the imaginable to beryllium utilized by China arsenic a mode to interfere with planetary commercialized and subject mobilization, House China Select Committee Chairman Mike Gallagher warned Friday successful an exclusive connection to Fox News Digital.

Gallagher, R-Wis., and committee subordinate Rep. Carlos Gimenez, R-Fla., visited the Port of Miami Friday greeting to inspect Chinese-made cranes and infrastructure amid worries that they mightiness beryllium utilized to behaviour surveillance connected U.S. ports.

"The Chinese Communist Party is the top menace to American sovereignty, and the visits contiguous highlighted however the CCP seeks to compromise our captious infrastructure and weaponize its power implicit our neighbors," Gallagher told Fox News Digital.

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A cargo vessel sits astatine the Port of Miami connected June 09, 2022 successful Miami Beach, Florida. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

Gallagher said helium and Gimenez saw however Chinese cranes exposure the U.S. to the hazard of imaginable interference from China. He said they "learned first-hand however Chinese-made cargo cranes present determination an alarming magnitude of the goods Americans trust connected from constituent A to B, providing the CCP with a instrumentality to disrupt American commercialized flows and impede subject mobilization."

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After visiting the port, the lawmakers traveled to U.S. Southern Command office to get accusation connected immoderate CCP power successful Latin America and however that power could endanger American interests.

Rep. Gimenez, left, and Rep. Mike Gallagher, right, sojourn the larboard of Miami. 

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Gallagher told Fox News Digital that the sojourn with SOUTHCOM subject leaders "further revealed the CCP’s targeted power campaigns successful our backyard," which helium said underscores the CCP’s "determination to crook our allies and partners against us."

"Put differently: the Monroe Doctrine inactive matters and we indispensable propulsion backmost against growing CCP influence successful our ain backyard," Gallagher said.

Rep. Gimenez, front, and Rep. Gallagher, back, astatine the Port of Miami.  (Giminez)

"The Communist authorities successful Beijing is America’s astir important nationalist information threat. The Communist Party of China is not a competitor, but alternatively an adversary that actively undermines the United States and our geostrategic interests," Gimenez told Fox News Digital. "For years, I person been informing astir the request to decouple from Communist China and diversify our manufacturing capabilities to conscionable our captious infrastructure needs."

Gimenez said helium wants to enactment with Gallagher to make "the champion strategies to support America from the CCP’s malign influence."

The sojourn to the Port of Miami came aft the Wall Street Journal reported this period that the Pentagon is present viewing elephantine cargo cranes arsenic imaginable Chinese spying tools. The study suggested Chinese instrumentality and cranes astatine ports could beryllium utilized for surveillance.

Members of the House China Select Committee are investigating however the Chinese Communist Party could airs a menace to U.S. nationalist information astatine U.S. ports.

The concerns astir Chinese spy tools besides comes aft a Chinese surveillance balloon transited crossed the continental United States past period for much than a week, traveling from Alaska to South Carolina, and hovering implicit delicate subject and atomic bases, officials said. The balloon was yet changeable down disconnected the seashore of South Carolina by the U.S. subject combatant jets.

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In its yearly menace appraisal earlier this month, the U.S. quality assemblage warned that China represents the "broadest, astir active, and persistent cyber espionage menace to U.S. Government and private-sector networks.

Rep. Carlos Gimenez, left, speaks astatine a podium astatine the Port of Miami, with Rep. Mike Gallagher, right. 

"China’s cyber pursuits and its industry’s export of related technologies summation the threats of assertive cyber operations against the U.S. homeland," officials warned, adding that China is "capable of launching cyberattacks that could disrupt captious infrastructure services wrong the United States, including against lipid and state pipelines, and obstruction systems."

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Officials besides warned that China is rapidly expanding and improving its surveillance, its artificial quality and large information analytics capabilities, which could grow beyond home use.