House of Representatives to Condemn China for Violation of US Sovereignty in Surveillance Balloon Incident

The US House of Representatives is set to condemn China for its use of a surveillance balloon over US airspace, following the incident on Saturday when the military shot down an object off the coast of South Carolina.

The resolution, introduced by GOP Rep. Mike McCaul of Texas, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, criticizes China for its “brazen violation of United States sovereignty” and denounces the Chinese Communist Party’s efforts “to deceive the international community through false claims about its intelligence collection campaigns in violation of United States sovereignty.”

Military and intelligence officials familiar with the matter told CNN that a day before the suspected Chinese spy balloon entered US airspace, the Defense Intelligence Agency quietly sent an internal report that a foreign object was headed towards US territory.

Instead of treating it as an immediate threat, the US moved to investigate the object, seeing it as an opportunity to gain intelligence on China’s surveillance capabilities. The resolution calls for the Biden administration to continue providing information to Congress through “comprehensive” briefings of the situation, including a total accounting of the incident.

The resolution is expected to gain bipartisan support, and is a sign of the growing tensions between the US and China over intelligence gathering and surveillance. The incident has raised questions about the US’s ability to detect and respond to foreign threats in a timely manner.