As the political community becomes increasingly concerned about the extent of Chinese influence on American society, a new nongovernmental organization is stepping up to take the issue head-on.
Officially launched on Wednesday, State Armor is a nonprofit that concentrates on global security threats and seeks to shine light on “malign CCP influence operations” both for the public at large and U.S. policymakers.
“States are now on the front lines against foreign adversaries. In fact, for years states have been targeted by well-resourced, technologically sophisticated foreign adversaries, particularly communist China,” said State Armor founder and CEO Michael Lucci in a statement to Fox News.
Lucci is a senior fellow at the Cicero Institute, a nonpartisan public policy organization that, per its website, seeks to “develop and fight for policies at the state level that restore liberty, accountability, and innovation in American governance.” He has been a presidential appointee on the Federal Service Impasses Panel and served as the deputy chief of staff for policy to the governor of Illinois.
State Armor says its policy goals include protecting critical American infrastructure, creating “supply chains of freedom” to source products from free countries, putting an end to Beijing’s influence operations in the United States, and strengthening American supply chains in the case of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan.
The organization is also reportedly drafting legislation and executive orders for more than 12 states.
“State Armor is going to bring awareness and ready-for-action plans to push counter-China policies that many of our state leaders know need to get done, but just aren’t sure where to start,” said former U.S. National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien. “This issue is not partisan. States want to take action; State Armor will be there to show them how.”
Lucci described the dangers Communist China poses to the United States:
The Chinese Communist Party is engaged in a broad effort to supplant the United States so it can rewrite global norms according to its authoritarian model. To achieve its goals, the CCP aggressively pursues a strategy to gain economic leverage over state and local governments, to make states dependent on their technologies, and to suppress the First Amendment-protected speech of Chinese dissidents within America.
The remarks reinforce concerns from U.S. intelligence agencies. The National Counterintelligence and Security Center, which is housed within the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, published a 2022 report describing China’s strategy to deepen its influence in state and local governments and gain the favor of local politicians to thereby “pressure Washington for policies friendlier to Beijing.”
According to that report, “The [People’s Republic of China] understands U.S. state and local leaders enjoy a degree of independence from Washington and may seek to use them as proxies to advocate for national U.S. policies Beijing desires, including improved U.S. economic cooperation with China, and reduced U.S. criticism of China’s policies towards Taiwan, Tibetans, Uyghurs, pro-democracy activists, and others.”
And on Wednesday, FBI Director Christopher Wray spoke before Congress warning about the threat Chinese hackers pose to the country.
During a session addressing Chinese cyber threats before the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, specialists identified potential U.S. targets. These targets encompass critical infrastructure such as water treatment facilities, power grids, pipelines for oil and natural gas, and transportation systems.
“China’s hackers are positioning on American infrastructure in preparation to wreak havoc and cause real-world harm to American citizens and communities, if or when China decides the time has come to strike,” said Wray.
The FBI director also pointed to the areas of artificial intelligence and disinformation and the use of Chinese-controlled social media platforms like TikTok as opportunities Beijing could use to gain influence within the United States.
It doesn’t help that the federal government under Joe Biden has taken a permissive stance in curtailing this influence.
As The New American previously reported, a probe by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) found that the Biden White House has been failing to properly keep track of the foreign ownership of American farmland — and does not even have a plan in place to start tracking that information. Despite the fact that Congress has mandated that the USDA set up an online AFIDA (Agricultural Foreign Investment Disclosure Act) database by 2025, the department thus far has nothing in the works to fulfill that directive.
Moreover, Biden’s policies have made America’s energy grid more vulnerable to control by China and other adversarial foreign powers. And it’s no surprise that the mainstream media has largely been silent on the matter; Beijing has spent major money to win over American journalists and executives at social media companies.
All of this is in line with China’s openly admitted strategy of using unrestricted warfare against the United States — economically subverting America and gaining influence over all aspects of government and society to essentially conquer the country without having to fire a single shot.
