Senators Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) and Bill Hagerty (R-TN) are calling for increased transparency for the foreign funding in higher education. The Foreign Funding Accountability Act will target Section 117 of the Higher Education Act. That law requires universities to submit biannual reports on all foreign gifts and contract transactions. The Department of Education reported last October that many colleges and universities fail to comply with Section 117.
The two Tennessee senators introduced the Foreign Funding Accountability Act alongside Senators Tom Cotton (R-AK) and Tim Scott (R-SC). China was identified as the main foreign actor that spurred the legislation. The bill would require the full names of all levels of foreign donating entities and the purpose(s) for those gift-transactions, close the loopholes allowing gifting by registered foreign agents and exempting in-kind gifts from counting towards the disclosure minimum, lower the minimum reporting threshold for disclosure in terms of dollar amount to $25,000, and levy a graduated civil penalty structure against higher education institutions that willfully and repeatedly violate Section 117.
In a press release, Hagerty outlined several key motivators for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to capitalize on American higher education: undermining this country’s principles for a free society, propagandizing the CCP as a good government, and stealing American intellectual property.
“As a strategic adversary seeking to overtake the United States, the Chinese Communist Party is going to extraordinary lengths to exert malign influence over America’s free and open society, including our higher education system,” said Hagerty. “By increasing transparency, closing loopholes, and imposing new civil penalties in U.S. law, this important legislation seeks to prevent the CCP and its intermediaries from hiding in the shadows to buy control and influence within our higher education, to manipulate what American students are taught about China, and to steal intellectual property from our nation’s researchers.”
Blackburn concurred that the dark influence of the CCP in American higher education motivated the Foreign Funding Accountability Act.
“Communist China has infiltrated American colleges and universities,” asserted Blackburn. “It is imperative we cut off Beijing’s access to funnel money in exchange for influence in higher education. Our children’s education should not be available for purchase by the CCP.”
It’s clear Blackburn gave special focus to educational issues last week. She also helped to introduce a bill to defund schools that use the 1619 Project.
The CCP gained a foothold in higher education through a number of programs, one of the most prominent being its network of Confucius Institutes. In March, The Tennessee Star reported that the CCP-backed institute had been rebranding their K-12 Confucius Classrooms quietly into the “Chinese Language Partner Network.”
In March, Governor Bill Lee also introduced legislation requiring transparency for foreign investors in higher education, and prohibiting the establishment of Confucius Institutes. Lee’s Transparency in Foreign Investment Act was listed among his key priorities for his 2021 legislative package.
Last New Year’s Eve, previous President Donald Trump introduced a similar policy to afford transparency surrounding Confucius Institutes and Classrooms. Less than a week after his inauguration, President Joe Biden revoked that policy.
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Corinne Murdock is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and the Star News Network. Follow her latest on Twitter, or email tips to [email protected].
Why doesn’t Hagerty and Blackburn do something really good for Tennesseans and our country, by replacing the Income tax as a primary method of taxation with a National sales tax? That is the Tennessee way, we do not have an income tax, our state operates with efficiency with a sales tax! Please introduce a bill to replace the income tax with a national sales tax! Sales tax is the fairest tax of all! Everyone pays it and it taxes a person on what they spend and not on their income! The Tennessee way!