Curtis Calls for Countering PRC Influence, Strengthening Support for Taiwan

The two discussed the State Department’s proposed $245 million Countering PRC Influence Fund and highlighted bipartisan legislation Curtis introduced with Senator Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) to dedicate a portion of those resources specifically toward strengthening Taiwan’s position and countering Chinese influence in the region. Read more about the legislation here. 

The Senator also underscored the importance of language proficiency among American diplomats, particularly regarding Uyghur language training. Referencing provisions from the Uyghur Policy Act, Curtis stressed that Foreign Service Officers serving in Asia and China should have the language skills necessary to communicate directly with affected populations and better understand ongoing human rights abuses against Uyghurs.

Secretary Rubio reaffirmed the Department’s commitment to expanding language training capabilities and recruiting Foreign Service Officers with existing foreign language proficiency, noting the strategic importance of specialized languages such as Uyghur.

The full transcript of the exchange is below, and video can be found here.

Senator Curtis: Mr. Secretary, thank you for being here. I’m always truly impressed with your ability to navigate around the globe so articulately and explain the positions. 

Like you previously, I chair the Western Hemisphere Subcommittee. One of the focuses that I’ve had is on Taiwan and Taiwan’s relationship in the Western Hemisphere.

We actually had our first Subcommittee hearing on Taiwan’s allies in the Western Hemisphere. And as you well know, Honduras switched diplomatic recognition away from Taiwan in 2023, in exchange for a lot of promises from China. No surprise—those promises have not been fulfilled. Their current president, during his campaign, talked about returning to Taiwan and restoring that relationship with Taiwan.

In your budget, you have $245 million for the Countering PRC Influence Fund. And I’d like to note, Senator Van Hollen and I have a bill that would actually carve off a portion of that specifically for Taiwan and countering the PRC influence there. So, I guess my question is, what can the U.S. do with the Countering PRC Influence Fund for Taiwan, particularly as it relates to Honduras kickstarting that relationship, developing a joint set of economic priorities for Taiwan in the Western Hemisphere? Anything else we can use that fund for? 

The Honorable Marco Rubio: Yeah, well, first of all, the reason why these countries would switch recognition, primarily, was because the Chinese would go in and they would say, “If you switch recognition, we are going to provide you this loan—and in some cases worse than loans, maybe there were even cases of bribery and things of this nature—but we’re going to provide you, you know, free this and free that. We’re going to build an auditorium for you. We’re going to build a bridge. We’re going to build a port.” 

And they haven’t kept many of those promises. So, I think the first thing is to just point to the fact that in many cases, these things are not provided.

The other angle is, if it’s loans, they create these debt traps, which is an argument we make all over the world, particularly in the Hemisphere. 

But the broader goal of this fund is not just simply Taiwan-related, although that’s an action they took as a result of this leverage that was established on them. 

But more broader, in many cases, these countries are trying to develop their telecommunication system. They’re trying to build roads, they’re trying to develop whatever it may be. And frankly, the only companies that show up are the Chinese companies, and they show up with lower cost, a financing mechanism, etc. 

Now, there’s a track record of not completing these projects. There’s a track record of flooding the country with Chinese workers that come and do the work. So, I think part of this fund is designed to create alternatives to that, to give these countries alternatives to the Chinese or other foreign malign influence that might be occurring in their country. 

Part of that is attracting U.S. commercial ventures to do it. But part of it is providing the resources so these countries can go out and do this without being subject to or vulnerable to this sort of leverage tactic that’s used against them.

Curtis: Thank you. Let me switch to China for just a minute. Your budget notes the merging of the Foreign Service Institute, where a lot of the state language training takes place, with the Human Resource Bureau, and hoping that can improve the language capacity. 

But here in the Senate, I’ve picked up the Uyghur Policy Act, which you led when you were here. Part of the bill that I’m especially supportive of is the provision that’s supporting the Uyghur language training for Foreign Service Officers is not only important but required, and that we have Foreign Service Officers in Asia and China that can speak that language. 

I think it’s absolutely vital that our diplomats be able to understand the people in their own language as to the abuses that are going on there. Given your previous experience on this bill and the Department’s focus on the CCP’s repression, do you still support this provision and can you just speak to how important this is? 

Rubio: Yeah, well, I think—obviously—the Uyghur language is not a widespread language around the world, but it’s incredibly valuable in an important part of the world. So, I think we want to see a language proficiency that’s generally been a challenge writ large over a period of time. One of the goals of the consolidation is to be able to drive language school more effectively and more quickly to Foreign Service Officers before they’re deployed.

Obviously, proficiency in certain languages are very difficult. Some languages are harder to learn than others, especially if the base of the language is, you know, like just to give an example, it’s easy to learn Italian if you speak Spanish; it’s much harder to learn Mandarin or the Uyghur language for that matter. So, language is a priority for us. By the way, in our recruitment tools, is one of the things we also look for is whether potential candidates already bring an existing second or third language, which is a huge benefit.

Curtis: Yes. Very quickly, you want to clarify, the President had a Tweet about speaking with Hezbollah yesterday. Do you want to clarify for people what happened?

Rubio: Well, we received communications via the Lebanese government and the speaker over there on behalf of Hezbollah as early as Sunday about that they would restrain from attacking Israeli territory if Israel did not take strikes, new strikes in Beirut. And so it came from Hezbollah, but through Lebanese authorities. 

Curtis: I think that clarification is important. Thank you for being here today.