‘We must not forget the people of China and their fight for access to information,” said Sen. Ben Cardin.
Sens. Ben Cardin (D-Md.), chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska) introduced a bill on Nov. 21 to help bypass the Chinese communist regime’s internet censorship.
Cardin noted that Chinese citizens are increasingly growing skeptical of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and seeking alternative sources of information, providing an “unprecedented opportunity to engage with the Chinese citizenry.”
The bill, titled Informing a Nation with Free, Open, and Reliable Media (INFORM) Act, aims to enable Chinese citizens to access information free from the CCP’s influence and censorship.
It also complements the State Department’s efforts to develop technology to bypass the CCP’s censorship “firewall” and to empower citizen journalists in China.
“One of Xi Jinping’s greatest weaknesses is that he is afraid of his own people,” Sullivan said in a statement. “That’s why the CCP’s vast censorship apparatus—its ‘great firewall’—works to silence free expression and deny their citizens truthful information about the corruption of CCP leaders.”
The INFORM Act would direct the State Department to create a comprehensive plan for engaging with Chinese citizens in the information space. It calls for the U.S. government to produce and disseminate Chinese-language content that would otherwise be inaccessible to Chinese citizens. Additionally, the bill seeks to increase funding for investigative journalism related to real-time developments in China. It would also support the State Department and the U.S. Agency for Global Media collaboration to develop content-sharing tools that can circumvent the CCP’s censorship.
Just last month, 3.4 million applicants had registered to compete for next year’s 39,700 public sector vacancies, official figures show.
Experts previously told The Epoch Times this may signal the start of a vicious cycle. The anticipation of youth unrest will cause the CCP to clamp down on freedoms, making China unattractive to foreign investment, which then worsens the economic situation and employment process.
Alex Wu contributed to this report.
Original News Source Link – Epoch Times
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