China's `Ethnic Unity' Law Means Repression Without Borders
Floor Speech
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Mr. McGovern. Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record an article written by Richard Gere, who is an actor and chairman of the International Campaign for Tibet. [June 28, 2026]
China's `Ethnic Unity' Law Means Repression Without Borders
To see where this leads, look at Tibet, where Beijing perfected its system of social control (By Richard Gere)
China will begin implementing one of the most consequential--and least noticed--laws of Xi Jinping's era on July 1, days before the Dalai Lama's 91st birthday. The Ethnic Unity and Progress Law may not seem threatening. It refers innocuously to ``unity,'' ``social harmony'' and a ``shared destiny.'' Buried in its many provisions, however, is something that should alarm every American: an explicit mandate to pursue critics of Chinese policy wherever they live, including here in the U.S.
Article 63 of the new law directs Chinese authorities to act against organizations and individuals outside China for any acts that ``undermine ethnic unity and progress or create ethnic division.'' Beijing is plainly asserting the legal authority to go after foreign citizens--Americans included-- for speech that the Communist Party deems threatening to its narrative about Tibet, Xinjiang, or any religious or ethnic minority group.
China has already gone to great lengths to monitor and intimidate Chinese dissidents abroad. Last month a Bronx resident and U.S. citizen, Lu Jianwang, was convicted of acting as an illegal agent for China's Public Security Ministry by operating a Chinese ``police station'' in Manhattan. Prosecutors showed that Mr. Lu worked under orders from Chinese officials to repress dissidents on American soil. He faces up to 30 years in prison. The Ethnic Unity Law now gives his actions explicit legal cover.
To understand where this leads, look at Tibet, which today is inundated with police checkpoints, facial-recognition technology and communications surveillance. Chinese Communist Party cadres are embedded directly in villages and monasteries, assigned to monitor Tibetan families and ensure their political allegiance. Monks undergo ``patriotic education'' campaigns. Writers face imprisonment, including Tibetan author Gangkye Drubpa Kyab, who is serving a 14-year sentence for ``inciting separatism'' and was previously imprisoned for displaying a photograph of the Dalai Lama.
When Chen Quanguo--since subjected to U.S. sanctions for human-rights violations--served as Communist Party secretary in Tibet from 2011 to 2016, he developed what became known as ``grid management''--dividing communities into tightly monitored units. When he transferred to Xinjiang in 2016, he followed the same playbook, which evolved into mass detention, predictive policing and one of the most advanced systems of social control in the modern world.
The new law mandates Mandarin as the primary language of education, government and social organizations. Despite Beijing's denials, these provisions directly contradict China's constitution, which guarantees different nationalities within China the right to their own languages and customs. The new law reinforces a system of colonial boarding schools in which roughly one million Tibetan children have already been separated from their families and communities and subjected to communist indoctrination.
The new law requires that all religious activities support ``ethnic unity'' and undergo ``sinicization''--Mr, Xi's term for subordinating religious traditions to Communist Party ideology. For Tibetan Buddhism, in which language is inseparable from culture and community, this amounts to state-directed erasure. The stakes will be raised around the succession of the Dalai Lama, likely one of the most consequential religious and political flashpoints of the coming decade. Beijing has already asserted that reincarnations of Tibetan Buddhist leaders require state approval. China is expected to appoint its own Dalai Lama and use a variety of diplomatic and other tools to validate him on the global stage.
U.S. policymakers should recognize the Ethnic Unity and Progress Law for what it is: a declaration that Beijing's ideological jurisdiction extends beyond its borders. This law and the oppression in Tibet are at the fulcrum of the larger struggle between liberty and autocracy.
Some 150 miles from the Tibetan border, in Dharamshala, India, the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan government in exile stand as a vision of hope and inspiration to the rest of the world. Emphasizing compassion and kindness, the Dalai Lama's spiritual and moral leadership exemplifies the victory of freedom and faith over autocracy and repression. It deserves America's support.
In May, Reps. Jim McGovern (D., Mass.) and Michael McCaul (R., Texas) introduced the Assuring the Future of Tibet Act. The bill would offer unprecedented support to the Tibetan exile movement and the Central Tibetan Administration as the genuine, democratically elected voice of the Tibetan people. The legislation is a call for the U.S. and international community to empower the Tibetan community as it defends its identity and our collective freedom.
Tibet has long been treated as a distant concern. It isn't. It is the place where the tools of modern authoritarian control were first developed and refined--tools now pointed outward. When Beijing moves to criminalize foreign criticism of its ethnic policies, it is testing whether the international community will accept the premise that no one, anywhere, may challenge the party's preferred version of history. That is a test the U.S. can't afford to fail.
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