Sens. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), a member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, and Mark R. Warner (D-Va.), Vice Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, urged Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats to issue a comprehensive and unclassified report on China’s participation in the international standard setting bodies (ISSBs) for fifth-generation wireless telecommunications technologies (5G).
This report will expose any Chinese efforts to skew international standards for 5G toward Chinese-controlled telecommunications companies and will allow companies in the U.S. to fully assess threats to fair competition and push back against them.
Rubio and Warner are the lead sponsors of bipartisan legislation to help combat tech-specific threats to national security posed by foreign actors like China. Rubio has long expressed concerns about the risks to our national security posed by Chinese-controlled telecom companies.
On October 12, 2018, Rubio and Warner sent a letter to Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau urging his country to reconsider Huawei’s inclusion in any aspect of Canada’s 5G development, introduction, and maintenance. Rubio and Warner are also the authors of bipartisan legislation to enforce full compliance by ZTE with all probationary conditions of a U.S. Commerce Department’s deal struck with the company last year that ended U.S. imposed sanctions.
