Senator Rick Scott (R-FL) on Wednesday announced the introduction of the Prying into Chinese Tyrants’ Unreported Riches, Earnings, and Secrets (PICTURES) Act, a bill that instructs the Office of the Director of National Intelligence to uncover and document with visual evidence the secret fortunes and shadowy assets held by high-ranking Chinese Communist Party officials.
The bill is designed to expose the offshore assets, financial proxies, and secret holdings of top Chinese elites, including CCP General Secretary Xi Jinping. According to Scott, the goal is to arm U.S. policymakers with intelligence that unmasks the financial corruption at the heart of one of the world’s most dangerous authoritarian regimes.
“Communist China’s ruthless regime has built a throne of lies, theft, and tyranny that undermines the very principles of the United States,” Scott said in a statement. “The regime in Communist China is lying to its people and the world. It is time the American people see the truth behind the CCP’s carefully manufactured image.”
Scott added, “My PICTURES Act exposes the hypocrisy of dictators like Xi preaching the principles of communism while living like emperors, hiding billions in secret offshore accounts, and profiting off the labor of the nation’s people. General Secretary Xi and his cronies are not world leaders. They are authoritarian profiteers who threaten freedom and the American way of life at every turn.”
The announcement came just hours after Scott questioned Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth during a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing about the dangers of continued U.S. economic ties to China.
“Do you believe that if the American public knew the risk of China and what you think about every day, that they would buy fewer Chinese products?” Scott asked.
Hegseth responded, “Sure, sir. It is our job to think about that every day. If a lot of the information we saw were to be made public, there would probably be more urgency.”
Scott followed up, “Whether it is Americans buying products that build China’s economy so they can build a military to try to defeat us, or whether it is buying Chinese drones or drugs or allowing them to buy farmland, you would recommend to the American public that we wake up and stop doing these things?”
“Generally speaking, Senator, yes,” Hegseth replied.
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