Nikki Haley says China is an enemy, U.S. firms need Plan B

American firms ought to be able to stop treating China as an economic competitor and begin viewing it as a national security threat, Nikki Haley, a Republican presidential candidate and former ambassador to the United Nations, said Monday.

“I believe China’s an enemy. I believe we’ve to take them incredibly seriously. And the issue is, you’ll be able to take a look at dollars and cents or you’ll be able to take a look at a threat to America,” Haley said on CNBC’s “Squawk Box.”

“Firms and folks have said for too long, ‘We’ll cope with China tomorrow.’ But China is coping with us today. We have to handle this,” she added.

Haley said “every company must have a Plan B” within the event that China decides to “pull the rug out from under us.” She called Beijing “the most important threat we have had since Pearl Harbor.”

The previous governor of South Carolina also criticized Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, who recently said the U.S. relationship with China needn’t be a “winner take all” contest.

“To even say which means you do not understand China,” Haley said of Yellen.

Haley’s latest remarks construct on the hawkish position she laid out last month in a Wall Street Journal op-ed, through which she vowed to push U.S. businesses “to depart China as completely as possible.”

She also urged businesses to forge stronger ties with U.S. allies, equivalent to India, Japan and South Korea, to grow to be less depending on China.

Haley pointed to a series of actions taken by China’s communist leadership in recent times that she said pose a multi-layered economic and security threat to america. They include buying a whole lot of 1000’s of acres of U.S. farmland, purchasing the country’s largest pork producer, floating spy balloons over America, spreading propaganda in universities, lobbying Congress through “front firms,” rapidly increase an enormous naval fleet, stealing U.S. mental property and developing latest weapons.

The Chinese Embassy in Washington, D.C., didn’t immediately comment on Haley’s remarks. Chinese government officials regularly insist that Beijing merely seeks a mutually helpful, “win-win” relationship with america. But American diplomats privately joke that “win-win” here means China wins twice.

Haley also suggested that China’s role within the U.S. fentanyl crisis raises questions on the long run of the bilateral trade relationship.

Most of the precursor chemicals that make up fentanyl originate in China before being illegally diverted to Mexico, where they’re processed by cartels to create the deadly synthetic opioid. The Department of Justice has said fentanyl overdoses are the leading reason behind death for Americans ages 18 to 49.

“I believe if it means us ending normal trade relations, you go to China and say, ‘We’ll end normal trade relations until you stop killing Americans,'” she said.

Haley’s alarm-ringing on China comes as she seeks to tell apart herself within the Republican presidential primary, which has to date been dominated by former President Donald Trump.

Only considered one of Trump’s competitors, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, has consistently garnered double-digit support in national polls of the first race. The remainder of the sphere, including Haley, has struggled to achieve traction with voters.

Haley took aim at DeSantis over his ongoing feud with Disney, which stemmed from the entertainment giant’s opposition to a controversial classroom bill in Florida. While she disagrees with Disney’s stance, “I also don’t think that governors should spend taxpayers dollars suing firms.”

Still, it’s difficult to predict how forcefully criticizing China will help to set Haley, or any candidate, aside from the pack within the 2024 election cycle.

That is largely because polls consistently show that a hawkish attitude toward Beijing is considered one of the few policy positions that enjoys broad support amongst each Democrats and Republicans.

As President Joe Biden mounts a reelection campaign, his administration is taking a tough line against China that bears a powerful similarity to those of Republicans like Haley.

FBI Director Christopher Wray testified this month that no other country presents a “more comprehensive threat to our ideas, our innovation [and] our economic security.”

Asked concerning the state of the Republican primary, Haley described it as a marathon, “not a sprint.”

She also said that she would support Trump if he’s the eventual Republican nominee. “I’m not going to have a President Kamala Harris,” she said, a reference to the view held by many Republican voters that Biden, who turned 80 last yr, is simply too old to be president.