Hawley moves to block China's buy-up of US farmland as Trump admin sounds alarm
FOX NEWS FIRST: Sen. Josh Hawely, R-Mo., is reigniting a congressional push to ban the Chinese Communist Party from buying up farmland and residential land in the U.S. on Thursday.
Hawley is introducing the Protecting Our Farms and Homes from China Act, which bans Chinese corporations and individuals associated with the Chinese Communist Party from making such purchases. President Donald Trump's administration has sounded the alarm about Chinese ownership of U.S. land in recent days, particularly around American military bases.
"China's ownership of U.S. farmland poses a direct threat to American interests," Hawley told Fox News Digital in a statement. "We should never let our nation's greatest adversary have access to our vital resources, including our housing supply. That's why I'm introducing legislation to protect American assets from the CCP once and for all."
While the bill would impose a flat ban on relevant purchases of farmland, the ban on residential purchases would only apply for two years, leaving an option for the president to re-up the prohibition every two years beyond that.
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The legislation also requires Chinese corporations and CCP-affiliated individuals who own affected land to divest that ownership within one year. It also establishes penalties for failing to comply with the law, ranging from fines to outright forfeiture.
Hawley's move comes in tandem with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) announcing its National Farm Security Action Plan earlier this week.
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The plan is specifically meant to address threats from foreign governments, like China, and how those threats impact American farmers. The plan laid out executive reforms and called for Congress to pursue legislation like Hawley's.
"The farm's produce is not just a commodity, it is a way of life that underpins America itself. And that's exactly why it is under threat from criminals, from political adversaries, and from hostile regimes that understand our way of life as a profound and existential threat to themselves," USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins said at a press event in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday.
"For them, agricultural lands and our farms, because they are a previous inheritance, are weapons to be turned against us," she continued. "We see it again and again, from Chinese communist acquisition of American farmland to criminal exploits of our system of agriculture, to the theft of operational information required to work the land and beyond. All of this takes what is profoundly good and turns it toward evil purposes."
Joining Rollins at the event were Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Attorney General Pam Bondi and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem.
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Numerous states have laws on the books restricting land purchases by those with ties to China and other foreign adversaries. Nevertheless, in 2021, over 383,000 acres had ties to China. While the number has dipped in recent years, it remains a significant issue, according to Agriculture Dive.
Fox News' Cameron Arcand contributed to this report