WASHINGTON—U.S. Senator Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), a member of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, pressed U.S. State Department Assistant Secretary for East Asian and Pacific Affairs David Stilwell Thursday on U.S. engagement with China amidst the global COVID-19 pandemic. At the committee hearing, Murphy specifically pressed the panel about how the administration’s decisions in the fight against COVID-19 have actually helped—not hurt—China in becoming a leader in global health.

“It is hard to overestimate the value of the gift that we have handed China through this administration's mismanagement of America's COVID 19 outbreak,” said Murphy. “It bolsters China's argument that autocratic or semi-autocratic forms of government, complete with the set of population control tools that are being pioneered in Beijing, are more effective at meeting modern threats than democracy. When a democracy can't get this epidemic under control after a half a year, when an autocracy can get it under control in a matter of months, they believe that that strengthens their argument.”

Murphy continued: “…[I]t's not that democracies are unable to get COVID under control, but our failure to do so as the world's most notable and leading democracy has strengthened China's argument that countries should follow their model and has just handcuffed our economy.”

Murphy also noted how the Chinese hail President Trump’s "America First" strategy because it allows them to gain leadership around the world: “One of China's preeminent defense planners at a conference in 2018 hailed Trump's America First strategy, saying and I quote, ‘as the US retreats globally, China shows up.’…How has the United States’ failure to control COVID strengthened China's hand, and how has our withdrawal from the WHO allowed for China to gain prominence on issues of global health?”

Murphy concluded: “…[T]he failure to acknowledge that we have done grave damage to America's reputation in the world by not being able to control this virus in the way that plenty of other democracies were able to, I think, you know, speaks to a real blind spot. And let's just remember it was the President of the United States who was the greatest cheerleader for China's response to COVID in January, February, March and April. There was no one who was standing up more vocally for China's ‘transparent’ response, their ‘effective’ response, than this president. That made it hard for a lot of other people to get tough on China when the leader of the free world refused to do so.”

In May, Murphy penned an op-ed in USA Today blasting the Trump administration’s China policy. In the piece, Murphy makes the case that the president tries to act tough on China, but in reality his policies have strengthened Beijing’s hand at every turn. Murphy also penned an op-ed in War On The Rocks making the case that we should empower and strengthen the World Health Organization after the Trump administration halted funding as a way to punish China.

Full transcript of Murphy’s question and answer with the witnesses is below:

MURPHY: “Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Thank you to all three for your service.

“It is hard to overestimate the value of the gift that we have handed China through this administration's mismanagement of America's COVID-19 outbreak. First, it bolsters China's argument that autocratic or semi-autocratic forms of government, complete with the set of population control tools that are being pioneered in Beijing, are more effective at meeting modern threats than democracy. When a democracy can't get this epidemic under control after a half a year, when an autocracy can get it under control in a matter of months, they believe that that strengthens their argument. 

“And second, our failure has given China this massive head start in the contest for global economic influence. China's GDP contracted by 6% in the first quarter, it expanded by 3% in the second quarter. Ours contracted by 3% in the first quarter, it contracted by 34% in the second quarter. And it's not just that autocratic governments were able to get this under control, South Korea didn't have a 34% contraction in the second quarter, they had a 2% contraction. And so it's not that democracies are unable to get COVID under control, but our failure to do so as the world's most notable and leading democracy has strengthened China's argument that countries should follow their model and has just handcuffed our economy. I mean, our business leaders can't even travel around the world because America is the sick child today while China now steps into that vacuum.

“We have compounded that error by withdrawing from the WHO. In Latin America, increasingly, reports suggest that those countries are relying on China, not the United States, in order to help them deal with COVID-19. China made a $2 billion commitment. News just earlier this month that State Department detailees will be removed from WHO regional and field offices all over the world. One of China's preeminent defense planners at a conference in 2018 hailed Trump's America First strategy, saying and I quote, ‘as the US retreats globally, China shows up.’

“And so my question is this for the panel, and I'd love your thoughts. You may contest the premise of my question. How has the United States’ failure to control COVID strengthened China's hand, and how has our withdrawal from the WHO allowed for China to gain prominence on issues of global health?”

STILWELL: “Senator, that's a fantastic question, and I appreciate the chance to lay out some of the thought process that went behind this.

“I think in large part, there's a couple key failures here. One is the failure of China to control what started off as a simple public health problem. And when they did control it in the town of Wuhan, where we have a consulate, they did it by very inhumane and heavy-handed tactics. They welded people into their homes. They rounded them up if they were sick and pretty much isolated them against their will. They separated parents from their special needs children and those children died from exposure because they were left. So that is a model, that's certainly a model, for dealing with this that I don't think any American would tolerate.

“Secondly, we're the third largest country in the world. We had 22,000 people coming from China for at least three weeks after the Chinese knew that this was a problem. And we were the first to close our borders to China and then to others on the 31st of January to deal with this.

“Third, if you look at the numbers, originally, we did not put our numbers out per capita . And being that it’s such a large country, when you compared our numbers to Belgium and Germany and others, they looked worse, but, in fact, per capita, we're better.”

“Fourth, we're not an island. The countries have done so well, Korea, as you mentioned, Taiwan, New Zealand, are able to cut themselves off from the rest of the world and prevent the disease from coming in. But they also cut themselves off from commerce, travel, tourism and all the rest, and those countries now, especially in the Pacific, are having a very hard time economically as the disease eventually will make its way into their countries. 

“And so, as you know, this whole problem began with the Chinese failure to deal with its World Health Organization requirements through the International Health Regulations to report these things. Secondly, their intrusion into multilateral organizations like the UN and the WHO had the WHO leadership telling the world ‘It's okay. I can give you documentation as late as mid-February.’ They're saying ‘don't overreact to this, there is no human to human transmission’ when the fact is there was. And so, the U.S. contributes between 400 and 500 million dollars per year to the WHO. The Chinese contribute around 40 million.”

MURPHY: “I think—I appreciate your answer, and I appreciate the fact that you've got to sort of hold the line here of the administration. But the failure to acknowledge that we have done grave damage to America's reputation in the world by not being able to control this virus in the way the plenty of other democracies were able to, I think, you know, speaks to a real blind spot. And let's just remember it was the president of the United States, who was the greatest cheerleader for China's response to COVID in January, February, March and April. There was no one who was standing up more vocally for China's transparent response, their effective response, than this president. That made it hard for a lot of other people to get tough on China when the leader of the free world refused to do so.

“So I hope that we can, as a committee, have a little bit more nuanced discussion about the effects of our failure on COVID and its impact on our reputation and ability to influence events around the world. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.” 

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