Comer on ABC’s “This Week”: We Need Stronger Ethics and Disclosure Laws to Prevent the Biden Family from Selling Access
WASHINGTON—House Committee on Oversight and Accountability Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) today joined “This Week” with George Stephanopoulos on ABC News to discuss Republican priorities in debt limit negotiations, the Biden Administration’s dangerous lack of action against China, and the need for stronger ethics laws to prevent family members of those in power from selling access to foreign adversaries.
On debt limit negotiations and Democrats’ false claim that Republicans want to make cuts to Social Security and Medicare:
“Thank goodness that somebody’s willing to step up and say, ‘We can’t keep going down this unsustainable path of spending one to two trillion dollars a year more than the government takes in.’ Somebody’s got to be the adult at the table and House Republicans will hopefully be that person.
“It’s easy to spend money. What unites the Democrats is spending money. When you get to the point where we are now, where we’ve got to make cuts, it’s a lot tougher. [Republicans are] not going to cut Social Security or Medicare. We’ve been very clear about that.
“It’s very disappointing that the President and Chuck Schumer would continue to try and scare seniors. These are important programs to everyone. There’s bipartisan support to Social Security and Medicare. If anything, we need to shore those programs up. They’re running out of money. But at the end of the day, those programs are going to be off the table with respect to cuts, but everything else is on the table.”
On the Biden Administration’s failure to stand firm against China:
“China continues to steal our intellectual property, they continue to steal our patents, they manipulate their currency. We believe they have a big footprint in academia with a massive spy ring within our research universities where they continue to steal our hard-earned research and development.
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“We’ve got a whole lot bigger problem with China than the spy balloons. […] “This is a problem for the United States, and we need the administration to stand firm to China.”
On the need for Congress to continue its investigation into TikTok:
“TikTok executives testified in Congress a year or two ago that none of the data that TikTok collected ever left the United States, but what we’ve learned from whistleblowers and media accounts is that some of that data did in fact go back to China. That’s a concern. It’s a concern for high level people in the government, because with that data ByteDance can tell where you are. If you’re using TikTok, they know where your location is.”
On bringing transparency to the Biden family’s foreign influence peddling:
“We are investigating Joe Biden. We know that Joe Biden said during the presidential campaign that he had no knowledge of his son’s business interests, he wasn’t involved, he didn’t benefit from them. We have evidence that would suggest otherwise.
“This is very concerning. Americans are outraged that China flew a balloon over the United States, Americans are outraged that China is trying to buy farmland. I think Americans would be outraged to know how much money the Biden family is taking in from China. And for what, we don’t exactly know. This is something we are concerned about, but we’re also concerned about a legislative fix.”
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“We need to know what is allowable and what isn’t allowable. We need to have strict ethics laws, and we need to significantly increase the disclosure laws in America. I think this investigation is going to be very important to fix a problem before it gets out of hand.”