House AG member on China acquiring U.S. land: 'Not only controlling what's above us,' buying up America's farmland
Iowa Congressman Randy Feenstra discusses his backing of the new FARM Act and the need for curbing Chinese farm ownership in the United States. The House Agriculture Member comments that he believes “that American farmland belongs to the American farmer, and what that that's what the [the FARM Act] does, it investigates why foreign investors are buying the land in the United States, and it goes through a review of why the investment being made, and if it is a concern for security purposes, then we have to stop these purchases from happening.” The Congressman says that Americans need to understand that currently “foreign investors own 37.5 million acres of American farmland, that's actually bigger than the state of Iowa, and what [Congress] wants to do is get down to why are they buying it. When we saw this in Grand Forks, North Dakota, where the fufen group, a Chinese based manufacturer, who is tied obviously to the Chinese Communist Party, bought land right next to a military installation. Alright, that's a security issue. When we see balloons flying overhead, it should give us great pause, that not only are they controlling what's above us, but they're also buying land that we have, that we do our business on. So we've got to get to the bottom of this, that's the FARM Act does, investigates it and stops it from happening.”