Sens. Cotton, Ernst Introduce Bill to Prevent Agricultural Tech Theft by Chinese Regime

Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) speaks during a hearing to examine United States Special Operations Command and United States Cyber Command in review of the Defense Authorization Request for fiscal year 2022 and the Future Years Defense Program, on Capitol Hill in Washington on March 25, 2021. Andrew Harnik-Pool/Getty Images

A pair of Republican senators on Wednesday introduced legislation that seeks to establish an office of intelligence within the Agriculture Department to keep U.S. agricultural innovations from falling into the hands of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and other “foreign threats.”

The bill (pdf), named the Agricultural Intelligence Measures (AIM) Act of 2021 (S.4768), was introduced by Sens. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) and Joni Ernst (R-Iowa). It seeks to establish an office within the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) by amending the Department of Agriculture Reorganization Act of 1994.