Chair Rodgers Opening Statement at C&T Markup of Four Bills (3.12.24)

minutes for an opening statement good afternoon and thank you chairman L today we are marking up four important pieces of legislation that will secure Communications networks from threats posed by the Chinese Communist party and promote us technological leadership I want to thank my colleagues on both sides of the aisle for their work on these bills China poses a significant threat to the security of our Communications networks companies with ties to the CCP operate in an environment tightly intertwined with the Chinese government raising raising serious concerns about the level of in influence and potential for exploitation by the CCP under China's 2017 National Intelligence law these companies are required to support provide assistance to and cooperate with China's national intelligence work wherever they operate which could jeopardize equipment used in American Communications networks relying on these Technologies comes with significant risk to our national security this isn't the first time we've worked to address these threats in 2020 we passed the secure and trusted Communications networks act to remove Huawei and ZTE entirely from our networks yet more work is needed to thoroughly address these threats vulnerability in consumer equipment such as routers and drones could be exploited by adversaries to spy on the public that's why I'm pleased that we're marking up chairman L's routers act which will would direct the national telecommunications and Information Administration to study what consumer routers and modems pose security risk we're also considering legislation from Miss stefanic to add the Drone manufacturer DJI which also has ties to the CCP to the Federal Communications commission's covered list which would prevent these drones from operating in the United States we should also know when CCP influence influence companies have communications licenses in the United States which is why today we're considering HR 2864 this transparency is important to understanding which adversaries are present in our Communications networks as well as the threat they pose finally we're marking up M matsui's future networks act which would direct the FCC to establish a 6G task force to develop a report on Sixth Generation Wireless technology carriers are deploying 56 or 5G across the country and we must look to the Future and make sure we are leading the development of these emerging Technologies this task force will ensure that the us both industry and government are doing what is needed to cement our leadership in 6G and win the future future the United States faces exceedingly complex threats from China and other adversaries that require a comprehensive and coordinated response this response must include efforts to secure critical Supply chains protect our allies strengthen cyber security defenses and engage in strategic competition with China in key Technologies failure to address these challenges not only jeopardizes our economic competitiveness and National Security but also risk sitting ground to an adversarial power intent on reshaping the global order in its favor that's why I'm proud of the impressive bills on today's agenda which address these issues and continue the bipartisan tradition of the ENC committee I want to thank the sponsors and the staff for their hard work and I look forward to moving these bills to full committee Mr chairman I yield back thank you the G yields back and the chair now