Republican Congressmen Chris Smith and Michael Burgess introduced a bill that would give Americans the right to sue the Chinese regime for damages they suffered as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.
The legislative proposal would override the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Law to give citizens the opportunity to take legal action in the face of the Chinese Communist Party's attempts to hide the virus outbreak from the international community.
"Knowing that Xi Jinping and his communist regime systematically failed to be truthful and transparent, our legislation seeks to not only gain access to more information but also provide much-needed relief to the loved ones of those who died," indicates the statement from Smith, a resident of the Congressional-Executive Commission on China.
The bill would also allow lawsuits for monetary damages, personal injury, damage or property loss as a result of the Asian giant's cover-up.
"The American people — who have suffered enormously from this virus — deserve to have their day in court to press the Chinese Communist regime on its reckless misinformation campaign, which hampered critical efforts that would have mitigated the virus’ spread and would have prevented so much pain and loss of life," said Smith.
“Our legislation seeks to not only gain access to more information but also provide much-needed relief.”
Legislative efforts to enable Americans to sue the #CCP over the #COVID19 pandemic have been renewed by Rep. Chris Smith and Rep. @MichaelCBurgess. https://t.co/3s25qWGRiy
— The Epoch Times (@EpochTimes) March 13, 2023
The proposal would also apply to other countries that provided false information to the World Health Organization about the origin, severity or transmissibility of covid-19.
The bill was delivered by the congressmen shortly after the House of Representatives voted unanimously to declassify reports on the origin of the pandemic virus due to the reports and expert opinions supporting the thesis that the coronavirus emerged from a laboratory in Wuhan, China.
"We must finally get to the truth about what happened and who was involved in this deception in order to bring justice to those who suffered profoundly from COVID-19," Smith said.
