‘The widespread, systematic, state-sponsored persecution of the Falun Gong by the Chinese Communist Party … may constitute genocide,’ the legislation reads.
The House has passed a bill with the goal of forcing an end to the Chinese regime’s long-running campaign of persecution against the spiritual group Falun Gong.
The bipartisan Falun Gong Protection Act (H.R. 4132), introduced by Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.) with 18 co-sponsors, passed by a voice vote on June 25. It is the first U.S. legislative bill addressing Beijing’s brutal suppression of the faith to advance through the chamber.
Falun Gong, a meditation discipline based on the principles of truthfulness, compassion, and tolerance, has been the subject of a relentless campaign in communist China designed to eradicate the faith.
For the past 25 years, adherents of the practice—numbering up to 100 million in 1999 according to estimates at the time—have faced lengthy imprisonment, torture, forced labor, and forced organ harvesting.
The Falun Gong Protection Act, which still needs Senate approval, calls for “an immediate end” to the persecution. If signed into law, it will require the United States to shun any cooperation with China in the organ transplantation field and to deploy targeted sanctions and visa restrictions to address the persecution of Falun Gong on the international stage.
Mr. Perry said on the House floor on June 25 that having to discuss the issue of systematic forced organ harvesting in 2024 is itself “very frightening.”
“Forced organ harvesting—a form of mass murder—this is something [like what we saw with] Josef Mengele, but it’s happening today,” he said.
“In China, if you’ve got the money, there is no waiting list for you to get an organ. … There’s a ready supply of these organs.”
Mr. Perry described the bill as the “first binding commitment by Congress to take strong legal action against the persecution and forced organ harvesting of Falun Gong, making Falun Gong the centerpiece of legislation—an action long overdue after 25 years.”
The Falun Gong Protection Act would also mandate sanctions on Chinese officials, military leaders, or others who are “knowingly responsible for or complicit in, or have directly or indirectly engaged in, the involuntary harvesting of organs” in China.
