{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.mcconnell.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/pressreleases?ID=B581D305-80F9-4F96-B294-816D498880C6", "McConnell: Subservience To Autocrats Neither An American Value Nor Strategic Interest", "2024-09-25", "2024", "2024-09", "Republican", "Senate", "KY", "Mitch McConnell", "M000355", "www.mcconnell.senate.gov", "mcconnell", "https://www.mcconnell.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/pressreleases", "scraper", "\u2018Hungary\u2019s leaders have made no secret of their conviction that the future is one of American decline. They\u2019re not hiding the ways they\u2019re preparing for American weakness and betting on our failure. There\u2019s nothing tough about bowing to autocrats. And there\u2019s nothing for America\u2019s leaders to gain by praising those who do.\u2019\n\nWASHINGTON, D.C. \u2013 U.S. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) delivered the following remarks today on the Senate floor regarding NATO:\n\n\u201cI\u2019ve spoken frequently about the welcome signs that America\u2019s European allies are waking up to the strategic challenge posed by the PRC, and to the dangers of predatory Chinese influence in their own backyards.\n\n\u201cLike America, our allies are watching the flaws of China\u2019s statist economic model laid bare. They\u2019re increasingly wary to hitch their wagons to a totalitarian system that stifles innovation, discourages free thought, and complicates free enterprise.\n\n\u201cThey\u2019re hesitant to take risks in a system where the rule of law is trampled by the whims of the state, and assets are subject to expropriation by the regime.\n\n\u201cEncouraging progress, like a German security strategy that explicitly recognizes the Chinese threat, and efforts across the EU to reduce reliance on Chinese technologies, presents opportunities for the West to work closer together. To secure supply chains. And to lower barriers to cooperation among allies.\n\n\u201cUnfortunately, this progress is not across-the-board. China may not be a safe business partner, but it\u2019s still an enticing one for far too many economies\u2026 including within the NATO alliance.\n\n\u201cI\u2019ve spoken before about Hungary\u2019s decade-long drift into the orbit of the West\u2019s most determined adversaries. It\u2019s an alarming trend. And nobody \u2013 certainly not the American conservatives who increasingly form a cult of personality around Prime Minister Viktor Orban \u2013 can pretend not to see it.\n\n\u201cHungary\u2019s leaders aren\u2019t cozying up to Moscow, Beijing, and Tehran in private. They\u2019re doing it publicly and vocally as well.\n\n\u201cThe Orban government has welcomed China\u2019s view of a \u2018European bridgehead\u2019 in Hungary as the perfect complement to its own declared policy of an \u2018opening to the East.\u2019 And it hasn\u2019t been shy about turning words into actions.\n\n\u201cWhen Chinese state enterprise has said jump, Hungarian officials have asked, how high?\n\n\u201cAs European allies began to heed warnings from the Trump Administration to reduce reliance on Chinese industry and technology, Budapest repeatedly blocked EU progress and welcomed a geyser of Chinese Belt-and-Road investment.\n\n\u201cIncluded in the torrent of PRC influence was five-hundred-million Euros from a Chinese electric vehicle manufacturer to build a new facility on Hungarian soil\u2026 and another seven-billion-euro investment in a new EV battery plant.\n\n\u201cMeanwhile, the Prime Minister of a former vassal of Russian communism has nothing but praise for the neo-Soviet imperialist responsible for the first major land war in Europe since 1945.\n\n\u201cViktor Orban describes the regime that has sacrificed tens- if not hundreds of thousands of Russian lives and more than $200 billion dollars in military force for its unprovoked \u2013 and thus far unsuccessful \u2013 aggression against Ukraine as \u2018hyper-rational\u2019.\n\n\u201cBut this NATO Prime Minister doesn\u2019t just admire Putin. He helps him. His government runs interference for Moscow, gumming up European and trans-Atlantic efforts to combat Russia\u2019s unlawful aggression at every turn.\n\n\u201cEuropean allies are providing more assistance to Ukraine than the US is, but Americans who complain the EU isn\u2019t doing more to help Ukraine should look no further than to Budapest\u2019s efforts to block additional EU assistance for the answer.\n\n\u201cAnd then there\u2019s Budapest\u2019s relationship with the Islamic Republic of Iran. Hungary\u2019s Foreign Minister has bemoaned that ongoing international sanctions make it \u2018really challenging to build effective economic and trade cooperation\u2019 with the world\u2019s most active state sponsor of terror.\n\n\u201cI have little sympathy for Hungarian companies that struggle to profit from their ties to the genocidal regime in Tehran.\n\n\u201cOf course, that hasn\u2019t stopped Hungarian firms from committing tens of millions of dollars to financing joint nuclear projects with Iran.\n\n\u201cIt didn\u2019t stop a national Hungarian university from inviting the former Iranian President to a conference on \u2018common values in the global environment\u2019.\n\n\u201c\u2019Common values\u2019 with Tehran. And here I thought it was American conservatives who claimed shared values with Hungary\u2019s ruling party. Has the Orban government forgot its adoring fans on this side of the Atlantic?\n\n\u201cNo. Hungary\u2019s leaders have made no secret of their conviction that the future is one of American decline. They\u2019re not hiding the ways they\u2019re preparing for American weakness and betting on our failure.\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s nothing tough about bowing to autocrats. And there\u2019s nothing for America\u2019s leaders to gain by praising those who do.\n\n\u201cSubservience to revanchist powers is not an American value. But far more importantly, it is not in America\u2019s interests.\u201d\n\n###", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-04-06T18:46:43Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.mcconnell.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/pressreleases?ID=B581D305-80F9-4F96-B294-816D498880C6"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 1.0053608566522598, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}