A group focused on combating the influence of China in the United States has launched a major ad buy to push state Republicans to move on President Trump’s agenda related to the threat China poses to U.S. agriculture.
The Protecting America Initiative, which bills itself as a ‘coalition of concerned American citizens and public policy experts who are committed to stopping Chinese influence in the states,’ launched a five-figure ad buy for the one-minute ad set to run in key agricultural states warning of China’s push to ‘control the U.S. agriculture industry.’
‘The CCP (Chinese Communist Party) is buying up farmland across our country,’ the ad says. ‘Stealing American jobs: Communist China is moving in to control the agricultural industry. This new war is happening right now without armies or any shots being fired. Who will dominate the world’s food supply? China is on the rise.’
‘We’re being ripped off at levels that nobody’s ever seen before,’ Trump says in a clip in the ad before the narrator says, ‘Republicans in the states need to step up and help President Trump combat the CCP.’
A farmer is featured in the ad with a clip from a Fox News interview in which he explains that ‘we all feel that we’ve been forgotten about here.’
‘We just want Trump to keep doing what he’s doing: Put America first,’ the farmer, Pennsylvania GOP state Rep. Eric Davanzo, continues. ‘Make sure that America’s food is safe right here and make sure that we have the land and the opportunity to produce and grow our food here.’
‘Tell Republicans to stand with Trump and protect America’s food supply,’ the closing line of the ad states.
The ad will be placed on national cable channels, including Fox News, in the key agricultural states of Missouri, Iowa, Georgia and Idaho.
Last year, the Protecting America Initiative released polling it said demonstrated that the ‘overwhelming majority of Americans are concerned about the CCP’s threat to the United States’ national security, food security, infrastructure, and higher education, and influence over our elected officials.’
Fox News Digital reported last year that the USDA’s most recent data suggests that, as of 2021, foreign investment in U.S. agricultural land grew to approximately 40 million acres. Additionally, Chinese agricultural investment in the U.S. increased tenfold between 2009 and 2016 alone.
The increasing number of land purchases has sparked concern that foreign companies and investors, particularly those from China, may be establishing a stranglehold on key U.S. food and energy supplies.
‘The Chinese national government, or some people say the Chinese Communist Party, has been about acquiring all manner of assets, not just in the United States but around the world, to control all sorts of resources,’ GOP Rep. Frank Lucas of Oklahoma told Fox News Digital in a 2023 interview. ‘I would argue that, in addition to the importance of national security – the guns and the bullets and the planes and the resources to defend ourselves – if we cannot feed ourselves, then we are lost.’
Fox News Digital’s Thomas Catenacci contributed to this report.