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Comment by 908B64B197 | Hacker News Reader

> Here's where I think this will first come to a head: I believe the US government will at some point soon decide that any person born in mainland China is a security risk as far as working on anything national security related. This will probably extend to key industries of national importance too (eg SpaceX).

Even naturalization or birth in America can't erase ties to Chinese entities, through family links for instance. Beware of double allegiances. [0]

[0] https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/former-raytheon-engineer-sent...

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One of the problems is that Chinese Americans may still have family ties in China, and the CCP's United Front [1] or other orgs will use those ties to extort, blackmail, or otherwise pressure them.

It's absolutely imperative that the US Govt, and the govts of all democracies, recognize and combat this, and take active measures to protect their Chinese citizens.

One thing that needs to happen if it's not the case already, is ensuring the 5th Amendment - no self-incrimination - protects any who want to come forward about such pressure. They need to know there's a legal safe-haven for them to cooperate with the government.

Democratic governments should probably also look into providing an expedited immigration path for their Chinese citizens' relatives still in China.

Right-wingers may complain about this, but they have to understand that: 1) historically, subjects/victims of oppressive govts are more likely to be allies of US and other democracies, rather than enemies, and 2) innocent till proven guilty must apply universally.

[1]:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Front_(China)

> It's absolutely imperative that the US Govt, and the govts of all democracies, recognize and combat this, and take active measures to protect their Chinese citizens.

Agree.

> Democratic governments should probably also look into providing an expedited immigration path for their Chinese citizens' relatives still in China.

Just want to point out that, Chinese spies tried to exploit expedited immigration paths in UK intended for Hong Kongers [1]. I don’t have an easy solution.

[1]: https://www.businessinsider.com/chinese-spies-try-uk-visa-pe...

>Just want to point out that, Chinese spies tried to exploit expedited immigration paths in UK intended for Hong Kongers [1]. I don’t have an easy solution.

Yup, though I'd rather get the innocents out first and deal with any spies later.

The general mistreatment and neglect of whistleblowers makes me think such a policy is unlikely to work.

In this case they would be whistle-blowing against a hostile foreign organization, so I don't think Snowden-like issues would apply here.

> It's absolutely imperative that the US Govt, and the govts of all democracies, recognize and combat this, and take active measures to protect their Chinese citizens.

Yes, but they can't protect the Chinese-mainland-living extended families of those citizens

> Right-wingers may complain about this, but they have to understand that: 1) historically, subjects/victims of oppressive govts are more likely to be allies of US and other democracies, rather than enemies, and 2) innocent till proven guilty must apply universally.

You are dreaming. In reality what will happen is that the US will realize that there is no shame in being 2nd place.

American exceptionalism is somthing created by the media, in reality phenomenons such as the shifting of the global powers have been happening since forever and are so enormous that they are like the tectonic plates. They can't be stopped or messed with.

It's not a tragedy either, Europe was #1, then it dropped 2nd place and people there aren't exactly running around like chickens with their head cut off.

It's only an issue here on HN and reddit where people love to deeply analyze scenarios that they don't have any real saying on.

The rest of people just live their lives concerned with other and more pressing matters.

It's impossible to make a case to right wingers because 2nd generation immigrants tend to be strictly left wing, and more progressive to boot. And imo, as a 2nd generation asian american, they tend to have a more overt racial identity and it doesn't necessarily manifest in a way that leads to a cohesive society. I knew a fair number of other asian americans who strictly saw America as a colonizing force, basically the bad guy. On one hand they're not wrong about the colonizing, but on the other hand it's not exactly a healthy mindset to have about your nation, and more to the point, it's antithetical to the entire right wing political ideology. The strict nationalism of the Chinese works in their favor imo, and the US doesn't have much of a chance in matching it.

Things will get really ugly once you codify special classes citizens and other US persons. It won't happen even though conservative congresspeople have been pushing for it for decades.

Well you have security clearances already no?

Yes, the cohort with security clearances is very white and eurocentric, which perpetuates a racial/ethnic divide between the in and outgroups for power in the US. Yes, you can't be legally discriminated against when seeking to be a wage slave, but if you want to get into the real echelons of secrecy and power, it's status quo, and without transparency.

It will. Yet, any country has the right to discriminate in any way against someone wishing to enter the country. It's once those people are let in, and given citizenship or PR that they enjoy protections against discrimination.

This would have to be a "moving forward policy". Anyone in the US already enjoys protection against discrimination based on place of their birth or race.

In the future, it could be a condition of entry that people acknowledge they are not allowed to work in certain industries, for the government, or universities etc.

Are you sure about that? It's the norm in Europe. E.g. you can't work for UK security services (MI5, MI6) unless one of your parents was also British, you lived in the UK for a while and you might be required to give up dual citizenship.

> Are you sure about that? It's the norm in Europe. E.g. you can't work for UK security services (MI5, MI6) unless one of your parents was also British, you lived in the UK for a while and you might be required to give up dual citizenship.

I think it's actually similar for US security clearances, though not explicitly codified like that.

IIRC, if you're a dual citizen, you have to renounce the non-American one. Apparently it's not good enough to say "I'll renounce it if you ask," since that's conditional (on them requesting it). You have to renounce it unconditionally. I think that even applies to allied countries (e.g. no US-Canadian dual citizens).

I think the US would also reject a clearance if the applicant had relatives that were in a situation that could be used to exploit them (e.g. foreign nationals, living in a non-friendly country, etc).

Basically, the idea is that you shouldn't have any (discoverable) competing loyalties, and you shouldn't have anything in your life that makes you vulnerable to manipulation.

Disclaimer: I have no actual expertise in this area, but I did spend an afternoon browsing the government website where they described security clearance rejection appeals.

I know dual citizen US folk with secret clearances. DoD is pickier with Top Secret.

It depends on the country. You will have to renounce for some even for S.

You can get approved for secret clearance if you are a citizen of a NATO ally. I guess because you can be vetted. Higher than that I think would be hard.

> US security clearances

The last U.S. administration quite clearly showed us that clearances mean utterly nothing and are a quickly bypasssble joke in the U.S.

I know US citizens who have Secret clearance and still maintain dual citizenship. And that includes some countries that aren't even treaty allies.

You are correct my brother got denied top secret clearance despite being active duty military because his wife is from a Caribbean nation. To get the right clearance is hard.

Constitutional amendment that the government can't deny citizens "privileges" and that they get equal protection under the law. There's a whole mess of court cases around that and it can get complicated. But it's going to be tough to get something like you suggest past the courts.

Those don’t meaningfully apply for security clearances where an argument can be made that it exposes someone to the possibility of blackmail, etc. (such as extended family in the mainland being held hostage, which has happened)

It already happens with naturalized citizens not being allowed to be president.

This is an important point.

I believe Chinese law is you can't hold dual citizenship so anyone with Chinese citizenship who becomes a naturalized US citizen loses their Chinese citizenship.

A shallow look at that may lead one to think there's no security issue. It's actually the opposite.

My sense is that this allows the Chinese government to entice former citizens with restoration of their citizenship if they come home, bringing all their skills and IP with them.

I'm not even sure this is explicit. It's simply understood that if you have knowledge in key industries the door is always open to your return to China.

Or it may be much more active and quid pro quo. Who knows?

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