Trump Executive Order Could Bar Some Telecom Network Imports
President Donald Trump late in the day May 15 handed down a long-awaited executive order addressing the use of technologies by foreign companies in U.S. communications networks. The Commerce Department is to issue interim regulations in 150 days and will seek comment, administration officials told reporters. Speaking on condition they not be identified, they stressed that the order is “country agnostic” and doesn’t specifically address Chinese telecom equipment manufacturer Huawei or the Chinese government.
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The EO bars imports and other "transactions involving information and communications technology [ICT] or services" without a broad interagency review. Specifically, the secretary of commerce, consulting with counterparts at the departments of the Treasury, State, Defense, Justice and Homeland Security; the U.S. trade representative; the director of national intelligence; the administrator of general services; and the Federal Communications Commission chair must collaborate in the review.
Trump told Congress he had issued an order “declaring a national emergency to deal with the threat posed by the unrestricted acquisition or use in the United States of information and communications technology or services designed, developed, manufactured, or supplied by persons owned by, controlled by, or subject to the jurisdiction or direction of foreign adversaries.”
The EO "declares a national emergency with respect to the threats against information and communications technology and services in the United States and delegates authority to the Secretary of Commerce to prohibit transactions posing an unacceptable risk to the national security," said a statement from press secretary Sarah Sanders.
House Commerce Committee ranking member Greg Walden, R-Ore., welcomed the order, in a May 15 interview ahead of its issuance. “It's important” for Trump to issue the order, Walden said. “We clearly understand the risk to Americans from the theft of intellectual property, from cybersecurity threats.” Telecom “is the key to national security and we have to make sure that the systems in place are not vulnerable to attack or disruption or theft,” he said. “It's serious stuff.”