A new report shows the Hickenlooper Administration directed at least $222,000 in taxpayer-funded grants to help companies expand operations in China, approving at least one grant application for a company involved in a Chinese program “which U.S. officials say has been used as a front for Chinese spy and trade-secret theft operations.”
According to the report:
In its 2017 grant application, Intelligent Imaging Innovations indicated that it could market its microscope technology to participants in the Thousand Talents Plan..
The Thousand Talents Plan was established by the Chinese government in 2008, with the aim of recruiting foreign-trained scientists, academics, and entrepreneurs to the country. The FBI has said since at least 2018 that China uses the program for economic espionage.
According to U.S. intelligence officials, the Chinese Communist Party has used the program to steal American trade secrets and carry out military and economic espionage operations in the United States.
Hickenlooper’s dangerously poor judgment on China recently landed him in hot water on the campaign trail for insisting China is a “great nation” and claiming “They do not want to rule the world. They don’t want to dominate.” Senator Gardner retorted: “Hickenlooper is a propaganda tool of the Communist Chinese Party. If John Hickenlooper wants to be a tool for China, we don’t need him for Colorado.”
John Hickenlooper’s poor choices and judgment continue to be a liability for him on the campaign trail. From breaking the law and being held in contempt by the state ethics commission, to spending taxpayer dollars aiding Chinese efforts to undermine American national security, it’s clear Hickenlooper was right all along: he is truly “not cut out to be a Senator.”