Warner, Rubio urge President Trump to reinstate ZTE ban

Today, U.S. Sens. Mark Warner (D-VA) and Marco Rubio (R-FL) sent a letter to President Trump, urging him to re-consider the deal lifting the ZTE ban, and to support the Senate-passed ban on government purchases of ZTE and Huawei equipment. Sen. Warner is the Vice Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and a member of the Finance and Banking committees. Sen. Rubio is a member of Senate Foreign Relations and Intelligence committees.

In the letter to President Trump, the Senators wrote, “The Senate and the U.S. Intelligence Community are in agreement that ZTE poses a significant threat to our national security.  The Senate recently voted 85-10 to reimpose the April sanctions order and the ban on ZTE buying U.S. components, and to prohibit the U.S. federal government from purchasing ZTE or Huawei equipment and contracting with any entity that purchases such equipment.  We urge you to heed the leaders of the U.S. Intelligence Community, supported by a strong bipartisan consensus in the Senate, that we must pursue policies that prevent the widespread use of ZTE products in the U.S.”

The Senators noted that at a February 13, 2018 hearing in the Intelligence Committee, six of the nation’s top intelligence leaders – the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) and the heads of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), National Security Agency (NSA), Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) – testified about the risks posed to U.S. national security by ZTE and Huawei. Additionally, the nation’s top counterintelligence officer, Director of the National Counterintelligence Security Center Bill Evanina, testified at his May 15, 2018, confirmation hearing that Chinese telecom companies such as ZTE and Huawei pose a significant threat to American security.  

“As you know, this is not a new threat. Congressionally documented concerns date back to a 2012 House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence report on the serious counterintelligence concerns associated with ZTE equipment, the ties between the company and government, and the risks to American national security,” the Senators added. “ZTE, though publicly traded, is a state-backed enterprise that is ultimately loyal not to its shareholders, but to the Chinese Communist Party and Chinese government.  This patronage relationship poses unacceptable risks to American sovereignty; risks that will only increase if the company is permitted to establish itself deeply in America’s telecommunications infrastructure.”