Bill would ban Chinese Communist Party members from purchasing land in the U.S., and set minimum penalties for foreign purchases that fail to comply with federal reporting requirements
WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) and U.S. Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR) today introduced the Securing America’s Land from Foreign Interference Act to prohibit members of the Chinese Communist Party from purchasing land in the Unites States and set minimum penalties for foreign purchases that fail to comply with federal reporting requirements.
“We cannot continue giving our top adversary a foot in the door to purchase land in the United States and undermine our national security,” said Senator Tuberville.“I hope my colleagues will recognize the importance of our bill and join the effort to prohibit Chinese Communist Party involvement in America’s agriculture industry.”
The full text of the bill can be found here.
BACKGROUND
China’s agricultural investments in countries around the globe grew more than tenfold from 2009 to 2016. China’s Ministry of Agriculture claims the country had over 1,300 agricultural, forestry, and fisheries enterprises with registered overseas investments of $26 billion, at the end of 2016. While Chinese entities held slightly less than one percent of all foreign-held acres in the U.S. in 2020, the volume of their holdings increased dramatically over the last decade. The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) reports that Chinese investors’ holdings of U.S. agricultural land surged from 13,720 acres in 2010 to 352,140 acres in 2020. Chinese investments in U.S. agricultural may provide the CCP with undue leverage over U.S. supply chains and access to sensitive information critical to U.S. national security. Foreign investors currently hold interest in nearly 37.6 million acres of agricultural land in the U.S.—an area larger than the state of Iowa. Alabama retains the 3rd-highest amount of foreign-owned agricultural land in the United States, at approximately 1.8 million acres.
As a member of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry, Senator Tuberville has fought to protect America’s agriculture industry from improper foreign investment. He introduced the Foreign Adversary Risk Management (FARM) Act to bolster the U.S. agriculture industry’s role on the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), the governmental body that oversees the vetting process of foreign investment and acquisition of American companies.
Senator Tommy Tuberville represents Alabama in the United States Senate and is a member of the Senate Armed Services, Agriculture, Veterans’ Affairs, and HELP Committees.
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