AG Bill Barr attacks Disney, Google, Microsoft and Apple for becoming 'pawns' of China and says Walt Disney would be 'disheartened' by his company's 'deals with dictatorships'

Attorney General Bill Barr on Thursday accused China's Communist Party of committing 'economic blitzkrieg' and went after U.S. tech giants for 'collaborating' with a regime he said is intent on surpassing the U.S.

At a speech in battleground Michigan, Barr went after tech companies like Google, Apple, Microsoft and Yahoo. He said they were 'all too willing to collaborate with the CCP.'

In blistering remarks, he said some U.S. technology companies had become 'pawns of Chinese influence.' 

He noted times companies bent to demands of the regime in Beijing to maintain access to the lucrative Chinese market, including Apple removing access to their Quartz news app. He said Hollywood 'regularly censors its own movies to appease the Chinese Communist Party.' 

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Attorney General Bill Barr on Thursday accused China's Communist Party of committing 'economic blitzkrieg' and called out U.S. companies who do business there 

'I suspect Walt Disney would be disheartened to see how the company he founded deals with the foreign dictatorships of our day,' Barr said.  

The United States has become overly reliant on Chinese goods and services, including face masks, medical gowns and other protective equipment designed to curb the spread of the coronavirus, Barr said.

He also accused hackers linked to the Chinese government of targeting American universities and businesses to steal research related to vaccine development, leveling the allegation against Beijing hours after Western agencies made similar claims against Russia.

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Chinese president Xi Jinping listens during the closing session of the National People's Congress, which included a vote on a new draft security bill for Hong Kong, at the Great Hall of the People on May 28, 2020 in Beijing, China. Barr blasted the Communist Party for its influence on business seeking to do business in China

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A crowd of mainly law enforcement officials are spaced two seats apart while listening to U.S. Attorney General William Barr speak at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Museum in Grand Rapids, Mich., Thursday, July 16, 2020

Barr's address at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Museum in Grand Rapids, Michigan, is part of a full-court press by the Trump administration to denounce China. President Donald Trump is trying to fend off criticism of his handling of the coronavirus and the U.S. economic downturn and to shift the blame back onto Beijing, and assert that he is tougher on China than Democratic rival Joe Biden.

'The People´s Republic of China is now engaged in an economic blitzkrieg - an aggressive, orchestrated, whole-of-government (indeed, whole-of-society) campaign to seize the commanding heights of the global economy and to surpass the United States as the world´s preeminent superpower,' Barr said.

'The CCP has launched an orchestrated campaign, across all of its many tentacles in Chinese government and society, to exploit the openness of our institutions in order to destroy them,' Barr said. 

Barr said the 'ultimate ambition of China's rulers isn't to trade with the United States,' Barr said. 'It is to raid the United States.' 

Administration officials in recent weeks have stepped up their rhetoric about China's alleged economic espionage, with a New York Post opinion piece by national security adviser Robert O'Brien and a speech last week in which FBI Director Chris Wray detailed what he said were efforts by China to steal American research and innovation. He said the FBI was opening a counterintelligence investigation related to China about every 10 hours.

Barr's speech amounted to a wide-ranging condemnation of what he said were Beijing's tactics to gain an economic upper hand in the 21st century and to pressure American corporate leaders to promote policies favorable to the Communist government. He warned that American business leaders could run afoul of federal foreign lobbying laws if they do not disclose relationships with Beijing, and that universities that welcome Chinese-funded initiatives could unwittingly lose control of academic research.

Hollywood, too, has fallen influence to Beijing, Barr said, accusing filmmakers of censoring themselves in line with Chinese propaganda.

'Globalization does not always point in the direction of greater freedom. A world marching to the beat of Communist China´s drums will not be a hospitable one for institutions that depend on free markets, free trade, or the free exchange of ideas,' Barr said.

Trump's own relationship with China has been complicated. He has spoken at times of a productive rapport with Chinese leader Xi Jinping, and former national security adviser John Bolton writes in a new book that Trump asked Xi for help with Trump's reelection bid.

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Attorney General William Barr participates in a law enforcement briefing on the MS-13 gang with President Donald Trump in the Oval Office of the White House, Wednesday, July 15, 2020, in Washington. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)