China Places Six-Figure Bounty On Overseas Dissidents

Chinese officials have announced a considerable cash reward for any information that could lead to the arrest of eight dissidents who fled the country — including three former lawmakers.

A bounty of 1 million Hong Kong dollars (roughly $125,000 USD) has been placed on eight pro-democracy activists who fled the city in the aftermath of a government crackdown on the Hong Kong protests of 2019-2020. The dissidents, who currently reside in the United States, United Kingdom, and Australia, have been accused of violating Hong Kong’s national security law, which criminalized calls for secession or subversion of the Chinese government.

“Our action is to tell everybody that endangering national security is not something we will tolerate,” Hong Kong Chief Executive John Lee told the press during a weekly briefing.

Hong Kong was seized from China by the British during the First Opium War and was administered as a British colony for nearly a century and a half. During that time it became a major trading center, and for decades it was consistently ranked highly on measures of economic freedom and human development.

Hong Kong was ceded back to China in 1997 after a 99-year lease for a portion of the territory expired. Britain was technically entitled to parts of Hong Kong in perpetuity, but for political and logistical reasons, agreed to transfer control of the entire territory to the Chinese Communist Party on the condition that Hong Kong would retain some autonomy for at least 50 years.

Hong Kong continued to function as a western-style democracy within China, and was governed as a “special administrative zone,” but over the subsequent decades, the Chinese central government began exerting more and more influence in the city’s internal affairs. Interference in local elections and a bill that would allow citizens of Hong Kong to be extradited to the mainland sparked massive pro-democracy and anti-government protests in 2019.

Those protests were met with a severe government crackdown, and the bounties placed by police on the eight dissidents are larger than many active bounties placed on rapists and murderers.

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Anna Kwon, one of the eight dissidents named by police, told TIME magazine that she has to be increasingly careful where and how she travels, and has limited her ability to engage with other members of the Chinese diaspora.

“The Hong Kong authorities are trying to rile up a mob mentality among pro-Beijing supporters,” she said. “It’s a usual tactic from the Chinese Communist Party to pit people against people.”

“During the 2019-20 protest movement, I was followed, struck by a car, assaulted with pepper spray and arrested on multiple charges,” Ted Hui, former member of Hong Kong’s Legislative Council and another of the eight dissidents with a bounty on their heads, said in an editorial in The Wall Street Journal. “260 people, as young as 15 and as old as 90, have been arrested for national-security offenses that carry a maximum sentence of life in prison.”

China has come under increasing scrutiny for its targeting of overseas dissidents — late last year, watchdog organizations exposed more than 100 secret Chinese police stations that were illegally operating in 53 countries, including the U.S.

 

Matt Gaetz Proposes Bill To Defund Jack Smith’s Investigation Into Trump

One Republican in Congress proposed stopping the flow of money to special counsel Jack Smith to rein in his federal investigation into former President Donald Trump.

After Trump announced on Tuesday that he received a “target letter” in the 2020 election portion of the inquiry, Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) said that he was planning to introduce legislation to defund the endeavor.

“I will be introducing legislation to DEFUND Jack Smith’s witch hunt against President Trump,” Gaetz said in a tweet. “They are attacking our democracy and engaging in election interference right now. The United States Congress has the capability to stop this election interference, and we must act immediately!”

In a video he shared in the tweet, Gaetz said he would introduce the legislation as a “free-standing bill” that would not have to wait for the appropriations process.

BREAKING: I will be introducing legislation to DEFUND Jack Smith’s witch hunt against President Trump.

They are attacking our democracy and engaging in election interference right now.

The United States Congress has the capability to stop this election interference, and we must… pic.twitter.com/g8ZAc4PAyb

— Rep. Matt Gaetz (@RepMattGaetz) July 18, 2023

Such legislation might gain steam in the GOP-led House, where Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) raised concerns about the prospect of unequal justice at a time when Trump is running for another term in the White House.

“If you notice recently, President Trump went up in the polls and was actually surpassing President [Joe] Biden for re-election, so what do they do now? Weaponize government to go after their No. 1 opponent,” McCarthy said.

Still, the bill would face long odds in the Senate, which is controlled by Democrats, and opposition from the White House. Gaetz himself acknowledged this challenge in his video, saying he was “under no illusions about Joe Biden signing such a legislative device into law. I know that [Senate Majority Leader] Chuck Schumer would never bring such a thing up [for a vote], but you deserve to know where your members of Congress are counted. Will they co-sponsor my legislation? I certainly hope they will.”

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The Department of Justice disclosed earlier this month over $9 million in taxpayer money spent on Smith’s investigation from when he was appointed special counsel in November through March, an amount that rose above reported expenditures on John Durham’s years-long special counsel investigation into the Russia matter and Robert Hur’s special counsel inquiry into Biden’s handling of classified documents.

Smith was tasked with spearheading inquiries into Trump’s alleged efforts to overturn the 2020 election results through the January 6, 2021, certification of the Electoral College vote, as well as his handling of sensitive documents after leaving office. Trump, who has already pleaded not guilty to 37 charges in the documents case, signaled on Tuesday that another indictment and arrest may soon follow.

“Deranged Jack Smith, the prosecutor with Joe Biden’s DOJ, sent a letter (again, it was Sunday night!) stating that I am a TARGET of the January 6th Grand Jury investigation, and giving me a very short 4 days to report to the Grand Jury, which almost always means an Arrest and Indictment,” Trump said in a statement posted to his Truth Social account.

Trump has also pleaded not guilty to charges in Manhattan tied to an alleged “hush money” scheme, and may yet be indicted in a 2020 election inquiry being conducted in Fulton County, Georgia. Trump altogether denies any wronging and claims he is the target of a “witch hunt.”

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