The Chinese Foreign Ministry published a “report” Sunday announcing the death of American democracy at the hands of wealth, racism, and “too many checks and balances.”
China, one of the world’s most repressive regimes and its most prodigious human rights abuser, has been using its government media arms for the past month to complain that President Joe Biden did not invite the country to its upcoming “Summit for Democracy,” a digital event in which the State Department claims world leaders will discuss “an affirmative agenda for democratic renewal and to tackle the greatest threats faced by democracies today through collective action.”
Instead of inviting China, which the Biden administration has formally accused of genocide over the ongoing genocide of the Uyghur people, the State Department invited representatives from the sovereign nation of Taiwan. The U.S. does not formally recognize Taiwan as a country because the Chinese Communist Party falsely insists it is a rogue “province” under Beijing’s control.
While complaining about Taiwan’s participation, communist regime outlets such as the Global Times have expressed more outrage that the U.S. excluded China, and fellow autocracy Russia, from its list of democratic invitees.
The Foreign Ministry published “The State of Democracy in the United States,” a 30-page tirade about freedom in America, in part to discourage the rest of the world from admiring the American political system. While the paper lists Beijing’s usual gripes about the United States – alleged rampant racism, wealth inequality, and the promotion of free societies abroad – it added a new complaint to the list: checks and balances.
The “checks and balances” system distributes power at the highest levels of American government in a way that, in theory, makes it impossible for one person or institution to control the country. The judicial, legislative, and executive branches can all “check” each other when one of the branches attempts to abuse its power.
Frances Martel