Defending Education Transparency and Ending Rogue Regimes Engaging in Nefarious Transactions Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. PERRY. Mr. Chair, I would like to begin by thanking Chair Foxx for her hard work in an effort to try to right our country and the committee that she so artfully presides over.

This amendment, Mr. Chairman, simply adds international organizations to the bill's definition of foreign source, including them in the bill's reporting requirements. It uses the definition found in 22 U.S.C. 288, which reads, in part: ``a public international organization in which the United States participates pursuant to any treaty or under the authority of any act of Congress authorizing such participation or making an appropriation for such participation.''

Unfortunately, Mr. Chairman, Americans are all too aware of the influence of international organizations such as the United Nations or the World Health Organization. As just one example, the World Health Organization was one of the so-called authorities trying to dismiss the lab leak theory, with the assistance of prominent academics and the Chinese Communist Party.

Many of our adversaries, such as China and Iran, are active participants in these organizations, much to my dismay and to the dismay of many Americans.

The fact that Iran was appointed to chair the United Nations's 2023 Social Forum, a conference focusing on human rights, would be laughable if not for Iran's own very grave human rights abuses, which are serious, to say the least.

I am concerned that should the excellent policies in this bill become law, our adversaries will instead attempt to funnel money to college campuses through international organizations. This amendment would address that possibility and shed even more light on these foreign gifts received by American colleges and universities.

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Mr. PERRY. Mr. Chairman, my good friend and colleague talks about protecting national security and implies that somehow this amendment would imperil that. I don't understand how letting Americans know more about who is providing funds internationally to our universities in our country imperils our national security.

We should know who is trying to attempt to influence not only what is happening on campuses but the very minds on those campuses, whether it is Confucius Institutes or an organization antithetical, maybe anti- Semitic, from the Middle East that is sending endowments and funds to American universities to influence the minds of those who are participating in education at those universities. It is important not only for citizens to know but, quite honestly, for our Federal Government and the security agencies to know.

Mr. Chair, I remind my good friend on the other side of the aisle that I had a bill some time ago to require this reporting, which is already required in many aspects and many respects, but universities, even with the requirement, don't keep the information and don't report any of it at this time.

Isn't that a peril to national security?

If we actually want to strengthen security in our country for our citizens, then I urge adoption of this amendment.

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Mr. PERRY. Mr. Chairman, I thank my good friend, the gentleman on the other side of the aisle, but, again, transparency is key. Universities have become, unfortunately, as we have seen in our public media on this very day and on these very days, hotspots for international insurgent activity in our country, things that are antithetical to our country and our way of life, things that we have never seen before, anti- Semitic chants on American university grounds.

If those things are being stoked, inflamed, encouraged, and paid for by international organizations at all, then Americans ought to know that.

Mr. Chair, I ask my colleagues to vote in favor of this amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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