[Pages S2625-S2628]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

STATEMENTS ON INTRODUCED BILLS AND JOINT RESOLUTIONS

By Mr. GRASSLEY (for himself, Mr. Tillis, and Mr. Cornyn):
S. 2815. A bill to amend title 28, United States Code, to increase
transparency and oversight of third-party litigation funding in certain
actions, and for other purposes; to the Committee on the Judiciary.
Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of
the bill be printed in the Record.
There being no objection, the text of the bill was ordered to be
printed in the Record, as follows:

S. 2815

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of
the United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

This Act may be cited as the ``Litigation Funding
Transparency Act of 2018''.

SEC. 2. TRANSPARENCY AND OVERSIGHT OF THIRD-PARTY LITIGATION
FUNDING IN CLASS ACTIONS.

(a) In General.--Chapter 114 of title 28, United States
Code, is amended by adding at the end the following:

``Sec. 1716. Third-party litigation funding disclosure

``(a) In General.--In any class action, class counsel
shall--
``(1) disclose in writing to the court and all other named
parties to the class action the identity of any commercial
enterprise, other than a class member or class counsel of
record, that has a right to receive payment that is
contingent on the receipt of monetary relief in the class
action by settlement, judgment, or otherwise; and
``(2) produce for inspection and copying, except as
otherwise stipulated or ordered by the court, any agreement
creating the contingent right.
``(b) Timing.--The disclosure required by subsection (a)
shall be made not later than the later of--
``(1) 10 days after execution of any agreement described in
subsection (a)(2); or
``(2) the time of service of the action.''.
(b) Technical and Conforming Amendment.--The table of
sections for chapter 114 of title 28, United States Code, is
amended by adding at the end the following:

``1716. Third-party litigation funding disclosure.''.

SEC. 3. TRANSPARENCY AND OVERSIGHT OF THIRD-PARTY LITIGATION
FUNDING IN MULTIDISTRICT LITIGATION.

Section 1407 of title 28, United States Code, is amended--
(1) by redesignating subsections (g) and (h) as subsections
(h) and (i), respectively; and
(2) by inserting after subsection (f) the following:
``(g)(1) In any coordinated or consolidated pretrial
proceedings conducted pursuant to this section, counsel for a
party asserting a claim whose civil action is assigned to or
directly filed in the proceedings shall--
``(A) disclose in writing to the court and all other
parties the identity of any commercial enterprise, other than
the named parties or counsel, that has a right to receive
payment that is contingent on the receipt of monetary relief
in the civil action by settlement, judgment, or otherwise;
and
``(B) produce for inspection and copying, except as
otherwise stipulated or ordered by the court, any agreement
creating the contingent right.
``(2) The disclosure required by paragraph (1) shall be
made not later than the later of--
``(A) 10 days after execution of any agreement described in
paragraph (1)(B); or
``(B) the time the civil action becomes subject to this
section.''.

SEC. 4. APPLICABILITY.

The amendments made by this Act shall apply to any case
pending on or commenced after the date of the enactment of
this Act.
______

By Mr. RUBIO:
S. 2826. A bill to safeguard certain technology and intellectual
property in the United States from export to or influence by the
People's Republic of China and to protect United States industry from
unfair competition by the People's Republic of China, and for other
purposes; to the Committee on Finance.
Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, when the story of the 21st century is
written, there will be a couple chapters about Vladimir Putin's Russia,
most certainly chapters about radical jihadists, and perhaps a few
chapters on some other things we have yet to fully anticipate.
There still remains over 80 years in this century, but there is no
doubt that the vast majority of the story about the 21st century will
be about the relationship between the United States and China. China--
the most populous nation on Earth, the second largest economy, and soon
to be the largest economy on the planet--is a country that cannot be
contained. It will be a major factor, both economically and
geopolitically, as it should be for a nation of that magnitude and a
culture that deep, with such long history. However, there are
imbalances developing in that relationship, which I believe are
threatening, not just to our Nation but ultimately to the peace and
security and the stability of the world.
It is on that topic I wanted to come to the floor and speak today and
perhaps about some of the things we need to do about it. There was a
consensus--which I would admit I, perhaps, from time to time, was a
partaker in--that China was a country that would, eventually, as it
grew more prosperous, become not just more democratic but more willing
to live by the rules the world has conducted itself by since the end of
the Second World War.
Perhaps I wasn't as strong an adherent to that as some others. I have
always been, of course, deeply suspicious of communism and autocratic
nations, but there was still the belief that things could work out,
and, eventually, at some point, both demographics and economics would
force China to accept the benefits and the wisdom of a global economic
order that has maintained the peace since the end of the Second World
War.
That was a terrible mistake. For, in fact, that is not how it has
played out. For the better part of 30 years now, China has been allowed
to systemically violate all of the rules of fair play in trade and
commerce under the guise of saying, eventually, they are going to come
around and behave. Not only has it not worked, it has allowed them to
accelerate their economic growth to the detriment of American workers,
American industry, and economies all over the world.
Today, China is 3 years into a plan called Made in China 2025. What
``Made in China'' means, and what it is all about, is China intends to
be the dominant power and dominate 10 key sectors of the future
economy. They outline what all 10 of those are.
Now, if that dominance was the result of being more innovative or
spending more money on research or just being better, then we would
have little to complain about. It would be on us to become more
innovative ourselves and put more money into research and technology
and these sorts of things. That is not what it is the product of. It

[[Page S2626]]

is the product of cheating. It is the massive theft of intellectual
property--the largest single transfer of wealth in the history of
mankind stolen; stolen because they buy small companies that are
developing some key component in a broader technology, and they take it
for themselves; stolen because when an American company or any foreign
company, for that matter, wants to do business in China and have access
to their 1.4 billion people, you have to partner with them. They make
you partner with a Chinese company. Your ``partner'' steals your
secrets and then they kick you out and now they are your competitor.
So think about it. They are able to make all of these advances
without paying for them. Imagine if you had a business that was able to
grow without having to pay for all the research that went to getting
you to that point. This is what they do. It has allowed them to expand
militarily, commercially, and economically to the point where we are at
the edge of a very dangerous economic and geopolitical imbalance that
needs to be addressed. It needs to be addressed now. We are almost out
of time because 5 years from now, 6 years from now, or 3 years from
now, it may be too late to address this.
I want to reiterate what I said at the outset. This is not about
containing China, nor is it about crippling China. It is about ensuring
that we are going to have stability in the world; a stability in which
our companies and their companies can partner, but they need to do so
voluntarily; a stability where they cannot steal our secrets; a
stability where they cannot violate the rules of trade but benefit from
the rules of trade.
That is what I hope to address through a new bill called the Fair
Trade With China Enforcement Act, which I am introducing today. The
first problem we want to address is that China is building its
industrial capacity with U.S. intellectual property and technology.
I have highlighted how they steal our technology and our intellectual
property, and they use it. As an example, General Electric and
Honeywell technology is being used in China by one of GE's and
Honeywell's competitors. They didn't sell it to them. It was stolen
from them. Two American companies had their secrets stolen, and now
their competitor in China is using their technology that they spent
money and time investing in.
The solution to that problem is to pass a law that prohibits the sale
of national security-sensitive technology and intellectual property to
China. The bill would do this by directing the Department of Commerce
to use its export control authority to block military capacity exports
and components of Made in China 2025 exports to China.
So, basically, the Department of Commerce would look at Made in China
2025. These are the sectors they are trying to dominate, and we would
prohibit the sale or the transfer of intellectual property sensitive to
those industries. That means American companies--even if they have a
partnership with China--would be prohibited by law in sharing this
information with them willingly.
The second problem we have, frankly, is here at home. We have these
large multinational U.S. companies that have very valuable intellectual
property and technology that partner with Chinese firms. They know
their intellectual property is going to be stolen, but they don't care.
They don't care, No. 1, because they are not going to pay the full cost
of the loss of this intellectual property. It is going to be borne by
the entire country.
A great example of that would be a CEO or business executive who
knows they are only going to be at the company for x number of years.
They make the decision: I don't care if they are going to steal our
intellectual property. I want to have access to the Chinese market
because it is 1.4 billion people. That is going to allow us to sell a
bunch of stuff there. Our profits will go up. I am going to look good
in the quarterly reports and look good before the board of directors.
Who cares if this harms the United States? My obligation is to the
corporation and not the country.
That is their view. In fact, many of these CEOs of large
multinational companies consider themselves to be citizens of the world
before they consider themselves to be citizens of the United States.
They are willing to turn these things over because by the time we are
hurt by it as a nation, they are long gone; by the time they are hurt
by it as a company, they are long gone, but they are going to have some
pretty good quarters as they expand into the largest market in the
world, and their shareholders and board of directors are going to be
very happy about it.
That is a big problem. Just because a company has their address in
the United States, does not mean they consider themselves to be
American companies. Of course, this is a big problem among many large
multinational corporations that are doing business there and know
exactly what is going on but are more interested in the short-term
profits than the impact on our national security.
The solution I propose to that problem in this law is to increase
taxes on multinational corporations on the income they earn in China.
The tax would be increased equal to the amount of the lost value of the
stolen intellectual property or technology. So if we lost $1 billion,
there would be a $1 billion increase in that business's profit that
they made in China through that partnership.
It does this by imposing a tax rate of 2 percent--roughly equal to
what the Trade Representative's office estimates is the cost of lost
intellectual property as a percent of total corporate profits in China.
The third problem we have is that China--and I mean China, both its
sovereign wealth management and individuals who made a lot of money,
directed by the government, in many cases--has gone on a buying spree
of U.S. debt--meaning Treasurys, stocks, and even real estate. My
hometown of Miami is one of the places being heavily invested in now to
increase their trade surplus and to weaken the U.S. economy.
You say how? Let me give you an example. After China rose to the
World Trade Organization, it had all this excess capital resulting from
its large surpluses. That drove them to take that excess capital they
were making now that they were part of the WTO and invest it in the
United States in real estate, for example. Here you have people coming
in and paying for real estate above the value of the property, driving
up prices. It is one of the things that helped fuel the housing
bubble. You can only imagine that if the property next door, the
building next door, or the luxury condominium units next door are sold
at a price higher than what the asking price might be, you are driving
up the market for everyone. But they do this over and over again. This
cheap financing of our debt, this buying up so many of our Treasury
notes because there is such demand for our debt, our yield--the amount
of interest we pay back to the investor--is lower. The result is it is
one of the things that has driven our national debt here. It has been
easy to borrow because it has been cheap.

What is the solution? The solution is to update the income tax treaty
that was signed in the 1980s and that taxes China's profits on these
investments, including their holdings of the national debt at a
preferential rate for what it would be for anybody else.
What my law would do is make withholding taxes on China's investment
income revert to what the law is for everyone else. For example, the
U.S. payor would withhold the greater amount of tax on distributions to
Chinese payees, so whatever income they are making from the debt, from
the stocks, from the assets they bought in the United States and they
have invested in--whatever they are making on it, they would pay taxes
on that income the same as anyone else would, as opposed to under a
preferential rate from the 1980s.
This is important because among the things that all of this surplus
investment does in the United States, it increases the value of the
dollar artificially. They did that when they were manipulating the
currency. The stronger the dollar, the weaker our exports, the more
expensive it is to buy something in the United States than somewhere
else.
The currency fluctuates as a matter of course through economic
engagement. This is the deliberate manipulation of our currency. This
is one of the byproducts of this. Taxing the income

[[Page S2627]]

they make on those investments the same as anybody else would have to
pay--and not this preferential rate--would help bring some balance to
that.
One additional problem we want to address is that the Chinese
Government's Made in China 2025 plan is a plan to displace advanced
American manufacturing, and they intend to do that no matter what it
takes. Let me give you an example. Made in China 2025 targets
artificial intelligence and next-generation information technology.
They target robotics. They target new energy vehicles. They target
biotechnology--meaning biopharma, biologics--in terms of curing
disease. They target energy and power generation. They target
aerospace, which is not just airplanes and space travel. They target
high-tech shipping, advanced railway, new material, agricultural
machinery. These advanced, high-tech industries are supposed to be the
competitive advantage of the United States in the 21st century.
What I am talking about is not protectionism. If this were a fair
competition of these technologies versus them, that is what free
markets are supposed to do. That is not how they are doing it. The way
they compete with us in these industries--in addition to stealing our
secrets and buying up the companies that are up in the supply chain--is
to deny our companies access to their markets, but they want full and
unfettered access to ours.
What is the solution? The solution is to prepare duties on and impose
Chinese investor shareholding caps on U.S. companies producing goods
targeted by Made in China 2025. This bill would do this by defining
Made in China 2025 as a countervailable subsidy for American industries
affected by Made in China 2025 exports, thus reducing future demand for
Chinese exports in these industries.
We have to raise the prices of the products they are stealing from
us; otherwise, they will put our industries out of business, and our
children will live in a world where we depend on China for artificial
intelligence, for robotics, for new energy vehicles, for aerospace, for
biopharma.
Can you imagine living in a world where the cure to Alzheimer's is
controlled by Chinese pharmaceutical companies--the amount of leverage
it would give them geopolitically? If they reach that plateau because
they outhustle us, that is one thing. But to get there by stealing what
we produce, by denying our companies the ability to sell over there but
asking us to allow their companies to sell here--that is not
competition; that is theft. That is an imbalance that needs to be
addressed.
We will also have the SEC block any majority stake acquisition of a
listed company producing the component goods in any of these
industries--the Made in China 2025 exports--in order to limit their
ability to buy up our small companies or buy up enough of a controlling
interest in American companies to take them from us. That is the other
strategy they have. They go into industries that go under the threshold
of what the government looks into, and they buy up percentages of the
company or the entire company itself. Then they control what is
supposedly an American company, and they own it. Try doing that in
China if you are an American.
The argument that we should continue to allow them to do it because
they are a developing industry is ridiculous. No one can make that
argument anymore. That is the argument that has been made for all of
these years.
There is one last thing we need to do, and it has been on the news a
lot lately. The Chinese have tried in the United States and around the
world to use their companies involved in telecommunications,
particularly Huwawei and ZTE, to infiltrate U.S. networks. Basically
how that works is they wanted us to buy components, parts, and
equipment from Huwawei and use it for our cell phone networks, our
internet networks, our servers and routers--put those in our country.
If you are a country that, as a matter of geopolitical strategy,
steals--not just spies as normal countries do, but steals intellectual
property and corporate secrets to build your economy at the expense of
someone else's and you control the routers and the telecom system or
enough of it in another country, we are just making it easier for you
to steal these things from us.
Imagine a major U.S. university conducting research, and their entire
back office and all of their computer networks in which it is stored
has Huwawei equipment. This would allow the Chinese Government to go
into this equipment and use it remotely to extract all of this
information. They don't even have to send any spies over here because
we have brought them inside. This is a problem across the economy, and
that needs to be dealt with in broader terms.
In this bill--a bill I have separately introduced with Senator
Cotton--we would prohibit the Federal Government or subsidiaries and
contractors of the Federal Government from buying telecommunications
equipment or services from Huwawei or ZTE. What we cannot afford is to
have in our own government--or in companies that are servicing the
government--telecommunications equipment and services vulnerable to
espionage, either corporate or national security.
Let me close with this. There are a lot of big issues going on in the
world, and for a lot of people, including myself, this issue is pretty
new. I have long been concerned about China's military expansion. They
are putting all kinds of missiles now on the islands in the South China
Sea. I most certainly have long been concerned about human rights
violations--what they have done with Tibet and the way they are
bullying people in Taiwan. By the way, just so you know the sort of
influence level they have, Marriott Corporation fired an American
worker--an American living in the United States, working for Marriott,
was fired because they liked a social media post about Tibet. So the
Chinese got mad. They told Marriott: You need to correct this. And they
fired the employee--this American--because he liked a social media post
by mistake about Tibet.
Do you know that United Airlines and American Airlines just got a
letter from the Chinese Government saying: Unless you change your
website so that it says Taiwan-China and not just Taiwan, we are going
to start fining you and may take away your ability to fly into China.
These are American companies that I hope do not give in. This is
happening every single day.
Do you know that Hollywood movies are made so that they will be
allowed to be distributed in China? Hollywood entertainment is
deliberately not making movies or saying certain things in movies--
political things, things that would offend the Chinese Government--
because if they do, they will not let them sell their movies to 1.3,
1.4 billion people. Do you know there are actors, like Richard Gere,
for example, who can't make major movies anymore because they can't be
distributed in China because he is in favor of Tibet and its
independence?
These things are happening, and we are arguing about a bunch of other
silly things. This is historic. This is the single biggest challenge
facing this Nation for the next 20, 30, or 40 years, and we are almost
out of time to take it seriously.
Just a week ago, I traveled to Latin America. I was in Panama, where
the Chinese have built not one but two port facilities on the Panama
Canal. Not surprisingly, because of all this investment, last year
Panama decided to switch. It no longer recognizes Taiwan. It switched
to China. Last week, while I was in Panama, the Dominican Republic
announced they have switched. Little by little they are going and using
their investments in these countries, first just to get them to
derecognize Taiwan but, ultimately, because they are spending so much
money in these countries to leverage them, to align their foreign
policy to China's in our own hemisphere.
We do not want conflict with China. We want parity, stability,
reciprocity, and fairness. That is not what we have right now, and we
have taken far too long to take it seriously. Now is the time to do it.
This is about more than just trade. This is about geopolitics and
national security. It will be the defining issue of the century, and
the time to take it seriously is now.
My bill, which we hope to continue to build on and improve, is our
effort to hopefully begin this dialogue and take steps on this very
important topic.

[[Page S2628]]

______

By Mr. DURBIN (for himself, Mr. Roberts, Ms. Baldwin, and Ms.
Stabenow):
S. 2830. A bill to reauthorize the rural emergency medical services
training and equipment assistance program under section 330J of the
Public Health Service Act; to the Committee on Health, Education,
Labor, and Pensions.
Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of
the bill be printed in the Record.
There being no objection, the text of the bill was ordered to be
printed in the Record, as follows:

S. 2830

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of
the United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

This Act may be cited as the ``Supporting and Improving
Rural EMS Needs Act of 2018'' or the ``SIREN Act of 2018''.

SEC. 2. REAUTHORIZATION OF RURAL EMERGENCY MEDICAL SERVICES
TRAINING AND EQUIPMENT ASSISTANCE PROGRAM.

Section 330J of the Public Health Service Act (42 U.S.C.
254c-15) is amended--
(1) in subsection (a), by striking ``in rural areas'' and
inserting ``in rural areas or to residents of rural areas'';
and
(2) by striking subsections (b) through (g) and inserting
the following:
``(b) Eligibility; Application.--To be eligible to receive
grant under this section, an entity shall--
``(1) be--
``(A) an emergency medical services agency operated by a
local or tribal government (including fire-based and non-fire
based); or
``(B) an emergency medical services agency that is
described in section 501(c) of the Internal Revenue Code of
1986 and exempt from tax under section 501(a) of such Code;
and
``(2) submit an application to the Secretary at such time,
in such manner, and containing such information as the
Secretary may require.
``(c) Use of Funds.--An entity shall use amounts received
through a grant under subsection (a) to--
``(1) recruit and retain emergency medical services
personnel, which may include volunteer personnel;
``(2) train emergency medical services personnel as
appropriate to obtain and maintain licenses and
certifications relevant to service in an emergency medical
services agency described in subsection (b)(1);
``(3) conduct courses that qualify graduates to serve in an
emergency medical services agency described in subsection
(b)(1) in accordance with State and local requirements;
``(4) fund specific training to meet Federal or State
licensing or certification requirements;
``(5) develop new ways to educate emergency health care
providers through the use of technology-enhanced educational
methods;
``(6) acquire emergency medical services equipment; or
``(7) acquire personal protective equipment for emergency
medical services personnel as required by the Occupational
Safety and Health Administration.
``(d) Grant Amounts.--Each grant awarded under this section
shall be in an amount not to exceed $200,000.
``(e) Definitions.--In this section:
``(1) The term `emergency medical services'--
``(A) means resources used by a public or private nonprofit
licensed entity to deliver medical care outside of a medical
facility under emergency conditions that occur as a result of
the condition of the patient; and
``(B) includes services delivered (either on a compensated
or volunteer basis) by an emergency medical services provider
or other provider that is licensed or certified by the State
involved as an emergency medical technician, a paramedic, or
an equivalent professional (as determined by the State).
``(2) The term `rural area' means--
``(A) a nonmetropolitan statistical area;
``(B) an area designated as a rural area by any law or
regulation of a State; or
``(C) a rural census tract of a metropolitan statistical
area (as determined under the most recent rural urban
commuting area code as set forth by the Office of Management
and Budget).
``(f) Authorization of Appropriations.--
``(1) In general.--There are authorized to be appropriated
to carry out this section $20,000,000 for each fiscal years
2019 through 2023.
``(2) Administrative costs.--The Secretary may use not more
than 10 percent of the amount appropriated pursuant to
paragraph (1) for a fiscal year for the administrative
expenses of carrying out this section.''.

____________________