WASHINGTON— U.S. Senators Mitt Romney (R-UT) and Dan Sullivan (R-AK) today introduced the Aligning Development and Competition Act of 2024, legislation that aims to reorient U.S. foreign development investments through the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) to better compete with China. DFC was created by the BUILD Act of 2018 with the dual mandate of advancing global development and U.S. foreign policy objectives through public and private investment.
“The Development Finance Corporation was created to respond to global development needs and the Chinese Communist Party’s Belt and Road, but it is currently not living up to its potential,” Senator Romney said. “In addition to providing development assistance around the world, DFC must also act in America’s strategic interest, promoting our national security and giving countries an alternative to accepting CCP investment through Belt and Road. Our legislation will do that by requiring DFC to prioritize projects that will help the United States better compete with China.”
“The Chinese Communist Party, its government and military are clearly the most comprehensive, long-term threat to the United States and our allies,” said Senator Sullivan. “In spite of America’s unmatched economic power and network of allies—astonishingly—the CCP is outcompeting us in terms of strategic investments in the developing world. Congress created the Development Finance Corporation to address that challenge. But a review of the DFC’s projects will tell you this organization lacks strategic focus and is failing in its intended goal. To better compete with the CCP in this realm, Congress needs to assign the DFC greater strategic focus on America’s national security interests. Senator Romney and I are putting forward legislation to do just that. I look forward to carrying this initiative forward in the new Congress as part of a larger bipartisan effort to address the threats posed by the Chinese Communist Party.”
Background:
China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is an immense challenge to U.S. influence and access globally. More than 150 countries have signed BRI Memorandums of Understanding (MoUs), and China is owed an estimated $1 trillion from these projects. China uses BRI to secure dual-use infrastructure and materials, proliferate corruption, spread authoritarianism, equip and enable surveillance states, extend its own surveillance arm, promote propaganda, disrupt democratic processes, and expand its global reach. The U.S. must use tools like DFC to advance our own national security interests and offer an alternative to China’s predatory debt-trap diplomacy.
Specifically, the Aligning Development and Competition Act of 2024:
- Requires DFC to prioritize projects that help the United States compete with China and other covered countries.
- Creates a Strategic Advisory Council to advise DFC on its foreign policy or national security objectives.
- Adds the Secretary of Defense to DFC’s Board of Directors.
- Authorizes DFC with additional flexibility to make investments in the vital national security interests of the United States.
- Requires greater transparency to guard against potential conflicts of interest of Development Advisory Council members.
Text of the legislation is available here.