National Iranian American Council Action opposes H.R. 9456, the Protecting American Agriculture from Foreign Adversaries Act of 2024, as it contributes to xenophobic efforts to demonize and target immigrant communities for political purposes and adds no benefits that will conceivably benefit national security. We urge members of Congress to reject H.R. 9456 when it comes up for a vote on the House floor later this week.
Notably, Congress has already legislated a core portion of the bill. In the Consolidated Appropriations Act for 2024 (H.R. 4366), passed in March, Congress already added the Secretary of Agriculture to the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) for the types of transactions outlined in H.R. 9456. Moreover, the appropriations bill required reporting on concerning property purchases linked to adversarial nations, without raising civil rights concerns for immigrant communities.
What is different is that H.R. 9456 requires overly broad reporting from CFIUS not based on whether an entity could have concerning links to a foreign government, which could be legitimate, but on any “foreign person of the People’s Republic of China, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, the Russian Federation, or the Islamic Republic of Iran.” Here, foreign person appears to be defined expansively, meaning any individual who is not a U.S. national.
Thus, what this bill is requiring is expansive and not targeted at legitimate threats, instead requiring reporting on any foreign national from the targeted countries engaged in agricultural purchases. Concerningly, this would include green card holders and visa holders, including refugees, who have been vetted and lawfully admitted to the United States. In so doing, it treats national origin as a legitimate grounds for national security suspicion, and potentially sets the stage for further restrictions aimed at denying the right to purchase property on wholly discriminatory grounds.
This type of illegitimate and discriminatory targeting should be opposed before it creates a slippery slope to worse discrimination.
Since last year, a number of legislators at the state and federal levels have put forward legislation aimed at denying the right to purchase property on the basis of national origin. This includes the Ron DeSantis-signed law in Florida, SB 264, which has harmed immigrant communities and received significant pushback from civil rights organizations, challenges in court and criticism from the Department of Justice Civil Rights Division.
There are significant existing authorities in place to vet legitimate concerns regarding foreign ownership of land through CFIUS. This legislation does not strengthen those authorities but does contribute to xenophobic efforts to demonize certain immigrant communities for political purposes and to impose modern alien land laws.
H.R. 9456 should be viewed in the context of this xenophobic push to impose alien land laws, breaking from prior prudent efforts to tighten oversight of foreign ownership of land and embracing xenophobic approaches that add no national security value.
Again, National Iranian American Council Action urges members of Congress to reject H.R. 9456 when it comes up for a vote on the House floor later this week.
Back to top