Exiled Hong Kong pro-democracy activists are bringing their fight for freedom to Washington, D.C., demanding that local institutions — starting with the Smithsonian — sever close ties to the territory’s official representatives.
Activists are calling for the National Museum of Asian Art to cancel the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office’s sponsorship of the museum’s ongoing Hong Kong Film Festival and are warning they will name and shame any other local entity that partners with HKETO.
And those D.C. efforts are just a warm-up for a nationwide drive to brand official Hong Kong tourism, business and cultural outreach as propaganda for a repressive regime. Those activists point to HKETO as the chief lobbyist against the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act, which stalled after passing the House in 2019.
The campaign underscores the U.S.’s new role as an alternate beachhead of Hong Kong pro-democracy activism as the government silences dissent in the former British colony. Activists aim to stigmatize local official representatives of the city’s government and rally the public and Hong Kong-friendly lawmakers for support.
“My vision is that there should be no more ‘business as usual' with the Hong Kong government abroad,” said Brian Kern, a member of D.C.-based activist group DC4HK, which is leading the campaign against the HKETO-sponsored film festival.
“We monitor HKETO activities [and] it is my hope that HKETO will not be able to appear in public in the U.S. without confronting the Hong Kongers whom the Hong Kong government is oppressing at home,” he said.
Campaigners have a two-prong strategy: calling out the Museum of Asian Art for its HKETO connection through a protest at the July 9 film festival opening and a letter sent July 13 to senior Smithsonian officials as well as six lawmakers — including Senators Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and John Boozman (R-Ark.) — who serve on the Smithsonian Board of Regents. Leahy declined to comment and Boozman didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Longer term, campaigners are also seeking the support of “congressional friends of Hong Kong,” including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chair Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) and House Foreign Affairs Committee ranking member Michael McCaul (R-Texas) to push for congressional action to restrict U.S.-government entities from doing business with HKETO. The campaigners include Hong Kong pro-democracy groups in Boston, New York, San Diego and other cities who vow to launch protests wherever HKETO has relationships. Activist groups have also launched a campaign calling an end to sister relationship with Chinese cities across seven countries.
The U.S. government has already signaled a willingness to punish senior Hong Kong government officials implicated in the territory’s anti-democratic crackdown. The Treasury Department imposed sanctions against 11 senior Hong Kong and Chinese officials in 2020 for “undermining Hong Kong’s autonomy and restricting the freedom of expression or assembly of the citizens of Hong Kong.” Those targeted included former Hong Kong chief executive, Carrie Lam and her recently anointed successor, John Lee Ka-chiu.
Earlier this month, President Joe Biden extended by one year an executive order that declares a “national emergency” related to the “unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security, foreign policy, and economy of the United States constituted by the situation with respect to Hong Kong.” The order suspended Hong Kong’s differential treatment under U.S. law — including trade and immigration policies — from China.
The Museum of Asian Art has rebuffed campaigners' demands that it break ties with HKETO. “We appreciate the group’s outreach … [but] our role as a museum is to foster understanding of the great diversity of Asian cultures and societies through a variety of scholarly and public programming,” Lori Duggan Gold, deputy director of the museum’s Operations and External Affairs, said in a statement.
HKETO is also unmoved. “Our office will continue to explore suitable opportunities to foster people-to-people exchange through arts and culture,” the organization said in a statement.
Those responses have infuriated lawmakers who want to bar U.S.-government funded entities from partnering with HKETO. "It is completely unacceptable that the Smithsonian Institution — a U.S. government entity, as well as national treasure tasked with preserving and expanding our society and knowledge — is working with the Hong Kong government’s U.S.-based propaganda office,” said Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), chair of the Congressional-Executive Commission on China.
Merkley’s sentiment is bipartisan. Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas), ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said Hong Kong should not be treated differently from the People’s Republic of China.
“Hong Kong is no longer considered autonomous from the PRC under United States law. The Hong Kong government has become a tool of the CCP [Chinese Communist Party], and public institutions nationwide should not be contributing to their objectives in any way,” McCaul said.
The focus on HKETO as a malign agent of the Hong Kong government is overdue, campaigners say.
“[We] have long underscored the HKETO’s role in Washington as a foreign entity that undermines American foreign policy and national security interests. That effort will continue on Capitol Hill and beyond,” said Jeffrey Ngo, policy and research fellow at the D.C..-based Hong Kong Democracy Council.
The film festival, which has been held for more than 25 years, coincides with worsening film censorship in Hong Kong. The government has effectively banned public screenings of films, including Blue Island and Revolution of Our Times. Both films depict brutal suppression towards pro-democracy protesters. Since the enactment of the territory’s draconian National Security Law in June 2020, authorities have also pulled “sensitive” books from public libraries.
The Hong Kong government’s attack on freedom of expression has included the removal from Hong Kong University of the Pillar of Shame statue that commemorated the June 1989 Tiananmen Square Massacre. Contemporary artworks with political themes have also disappeared from the city’s flagship art museum in recent months.
“If the [National Museum of Asian Art] truly wants to help promote understanding of the Hong Kong society and its culture, they are always welcome to work with Hong Kongers,” said Frances Hui, director of the U.S.-based nonprofit pro-democracy organization, We The Hongkongers. The group recently organized screenings in the U.S. of the banned Hong Kong pro-democracy protest film, May You Stay Forever Young.
The campaign reflects how Hong Kong’s pro-democracy diaspora is mobilizing worldwide to disrupt the government's overseas branding efforts. Protesters in Vancouver, Canada picketed HKETO events celebrating this year’s 25th anniversary of Hong Kong’s handover to China from British rule. The public transit operator in Brussels pulled tram ads commemorating the handover while a public outcry forced city officials to backtrack from a plan to garb the iconic “Manneken Pis'' statue in a “Hong Kong costume.”
Hong Kong authorities have dismissed these protests as “nuisances.” But it is concerned about the reputational damage of the protests and is pushing back. “The economic and trade offices in different places have been closely watching all the incorrect information released by local media and making direct responses,” Algernon Yau Ying-wah, Hong Kong’s secretary of commerce and economic development, told the South China Morning post last week.
Hong Kong pro-democracy campaigners aim to educate both the U.S. public and lawmakers about the need for a much more robust U.S. government response to the plight of Hong Kong’s people. Those activists are lobbying lawmakers to support initiatives, including humanitarian visas for Hong Kongers, sanctioning of greater numbers of Hong Kong officials and discouraging U.S. trade with CCP-backed businesses. And they are pushing for legislation contained in the America COMPETES Act, as well as standalone bills like the Hong Kong People's Freedom and Choice Act and the Hong Kong Safe Harbor Act that will lift immigration restrictions on Hong Kongers who want to flee the city.
The Hong Kong pro-democracy community is also eyeing upcoming U.S.midterm elections as an opportunity to push for greater domestic support.
“Calling on Hong Kongers in the United States to contact election candidates, attend town hall meetings, secure legislative support, and get their stance on records, are some first steps our diaspora can make together,” said Anna Kwok, strategy and campaign director at Hong Kong Democracy Council.
Hong Kong pro-democracy activists are planning to brief midterm congressional candidates on the need for more robust U.S. government action to punish Hong Kong authorities for their assault on universal rights and rule of law. “We are actually going to send [candidates] the 15 people from your district, who vote in your district, who care about the issue to actually meet with you back in your home district,” said Samuel Chu, president of the nonprofit The Campaign for Hong Kong.
Lawmakers are listening. The Congressional-Executive Commission on China last week declared that Hong Kong has pursued thousands of politically motivated prosecutions targeting “protesters, journalists, civil society workers and opposition political figures.” A letter signed by the bipartisan commissioners on Wednesday urged the Biden administration to respond with "additional sanctions."
"Such sanctions will be a tangible demonstration of the Administration’s interest in the PRC and Hong Kong authorities upholding their international legal obligations as well as international interest in the release of political prisoners," the letter said.
“These are people that are participating in the repression and the destruction of what's left of Hong Kong's system at this point,” said Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.).
