02/13/20

Jussie Smollett Should Not be Rewarded for His Crime

By: Lloyd Marcus

Actress Taraji P. Henson and other cast members of the Empire TV show are lobbying for former cast member Jussie Smollett to be allowed back on the show for the finale. Taraji said, “We can’t end the show without him. He’s such an integral part to the show.”

Folks, Jussie Smollett is the openly homosexual black professional actor who staged a hoax, purposely attempting to ignite racial hatred and violence against Trump-supporters.

Smollett claimed he was attacked one night by two white guys who yelled, “This is MAGA country!” Smollett said they poured bleach on him and tried to tie a rope around his neck. The problem is, it was all a huge lie. In essence, this evil man attempted to launch a race war.

I only mentioned Smollett’s homosexuality because Democrats, Hollywood, and fake news media exploited it to promote their lie that Trump-supporters hate blacks and homosexuals.

The Chicago mayor and police department were outraged when the state’s attorney dropped all 16 felony charges against Smollett for staging the hoax. The city of Chicago demands that Smollett pay the $130,000 for the cost of investigating his bogus attack. Despite documented evidence that Smollett staged a hoax, he is still arrogantly claiming he did nothing wrong.

Seniors, women, and even teens who wear MAGA caps are being assaulted and severely beaten because of deranged Trump-resisters like Smollett spreading lies about Trump and his supporters.

Apparently, Taraji thinks we should get the heck over it because Smollett is good for her TV show. Smollett attempted to generate racial violence and arrogantly remains unrepentant. Justice requires that his career be over.

Folks, why are progressives never held accountable for promoting racial hate, hatred for achievers, hatred for Christians, hatred for straight white men, hatred for successful blacks who do not vote Democrat, and hatred for police? Progressives are not even held accountable for promoting and implementing violence upon anyone who disagrees with their radical agenda?

Jussie Smollett should be all over media apologizing to Trump, his supporters, and America. Bets are that will never happen.

Lloyd Marcus, The Unhyphenated American
Help Lloyd Spread the Truth
https://www.trumptrainusa2020.com/
http://LloydMarcus.com

02/13/20

Bill Whittle: “The Cold War: What We Saw” – Episodes 1 and 2

From: Bill Whittle

World War III — the Apocalypse that never was — started in the same place that World War II in Europe had ended: Berlin. “An Iron Curtain has descended across the Continent,” said Winston Churchill, and that curtain ran right through the heart of Berlin. On the Eastern side, the collectivist, state-centered world of Joseph Stalin communist ideology, armed to the teeth with conventional forces. On the other side — the Western side — a war-weary alliance of capitalist countries, led by the beacon of individual rights, the United States.

In Part 1 of The Cold War: What We Saw, we will peel back the layers of mystery cloaking the Terror state run by the Kremlin, and watch as America takes its first small steps onto the stage of world leadership.

After the defeat of Germany, Joseph Stalin looked at the pieces laid out on the board in front of him with satisfaction that bordered on glee. His Red Army, consisting of millions of battle-hardened troops, thousands of tanks and an equal number of artillery pieces had come to a halt — temporarily, thought Stalin — where they had encountered the British and American forces attacking from the West. Those forces, he knew, were no match for the sheer mass his Soviet Union had mustered, and he was certain that the Western Democracies did not have the stomach for another long and bloody war. Soon all of Europe would be his, and his communist ideology fulfilled.

But all of that changed when the Americans had conjured two brilliant flashes of light over Japan and brought a sudden end to the Second World War. Would American atomic wizardry be enough of a deterrent to prevent the Third?

02/13/20

US Navy Seizes Iran Ship with SAMs on Board

By: Denise Simon | Founders Code

Our turn eh? Hmmm, the same day that the Senate votes to limit the President’s war power measures on declaring war with Iran, this event from last week hits the headlines. By the way, President Trump has never indicated he would go to war with Iran with or without Congressional approval so that whole bi-partisan measure in the Senate was just a formality… a gesture.

The Senate passed a war powers resolution Thursday that constrains President Donald Trump’s ability to authorize military strikes against Iran.

The resolution from Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine received bipartisan support. It passed 55–45 with eight Republicans voting with Democrats in favor. However, Trump has signaled he will veto the resolution, and there are not enough votes in Congress to override the veto.

Kaine introduced the resolution in early January after escalating tensions with Iran culminated in an American strike killing Iranian general Qassem Soleimani and Iran responding by firing missiles at two American bases in Iraq. The administration gave Congress a briefing to justify the strike after the fact, which didn’t satisfy Democrats and infuriated two administration allies, Republican Reps. Mike Lee and Rand Paul.

“The nation should not be at war without a vote of Congress,” said Kaine Wednesday. “Even if he chooses to veto it and we can’t override, the will of both bodies and the public they represent, that could be a factor in his decision making.” h/t

Anyway, back to the SAMs…surface to air missiles…

U.S. Warship in Arabian Sea Seizes Suspected Iranian Weapons

***Ticonderoga-class guided-missile cruiser USS Normandy (CG-60) seized a cache of Iranian-made anti-tank missiles and other munitions aboard a dhow in the Arabian Sea over the weekend.

The Normandy stopped the dhow while conducting maritime security operations over the weekend, in accordance with international law, according to a statement released Thursday by U.S. Central Command.

The seized weapons include:

150 Dehlavieh anti-tank missiles, which are Iranian-made version of the Russian Kornet anti-tank missiles.
Three Iranian-made surface-to-air missiles.
Thermal imaging weapon scopes.
Components for manned and unmanned aerial and surface vessels.

The CENTCOM statement noted that many of the munitions seized over the weekend by Normandy are similar to weapons and components seized in November by the crew of Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Forrest Sherman (DDG-98).

The weapons included 358 surface-to-air missile components and ‘Dehlavieh’ anti-tank guided missiles (ATGM), intended for the Houthis in Yemen, aboard a stateless dhow during a maritime interdiction operation in the U.S. Fifth Fleet area of operations on Feb. 9, 2020. US Navy Photo

The weapons seized by Forrest Sherman were determined to be destined for Houthi rebels fighting in Yemen, according to CENTCOM. Houthi rebels have been fighting Saudi Arabian forces in Yemen for five years. The force has used unmanned aerial and surface vessels to attack Saudi Arabian forces in the past, using equipment that U.S. military experts say comes from Iran.

The shipment of weapons seized over the weekend would violate a United Nations Security Council resolution prohibiting the “direct or indirect supply, sale, or transfer of weapons to the Houthis,” the CENTCOM statement notes.

02/13/20

Hunter and The Truman National Security Project

By: Denise Simon | Founders Code

Turn the corner and we find yet another swampy organization where Hunter Biden had a parking space called the Truman National Security Project. Yeesh, this outfit is really a left-leaning organization founded by Rachel Kleinfeld. She is also a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

The roster of young Truman fellows in high places includes Matthew Spence, who co-founded Truman with Kleinfeld and is now a senior aide to Obama’s National Security Adviser Tom Donilon, and Eric Lesser, who until he left for Harvard Law this summer worked in the White House, first as David Axelrod’s right-hand man and then as director of strategic planning for the Council of Economic Advisers. (He also organized the annual White House Seder.) Others have worked in the Department of Homeland Security, the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and Committee on Foreign Affairs, and the Pentagon offices of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. There are journalists, like Patrick Radden Keefe, and analyst-bloggers like Micah Zenko, of the Council on Foreign Relations. And there are people like Liz McNally, a West Point graduate and Rhodes Scholar who worked as a speechwriter for Gen. David Petraeus in Iraq—and who, in August, wound up on the cover of Time magazine under the headline “The New Greatest Generation.” More context and details here.

Okay, back to Hunter…

\In 2011, two years into his father’s term as vice president, Hunter Biden was appointed by the Truman National Security Project, a left-leaning foreign policy network, to its board of directors. The younger Biden was, at the time, one of just six members of the governing board, where he served alongside the organization’s founder and CEO, Rachel Kleinfeld, and a handful of corporate leaders. He had no obvious qualifications for the position.

As the Truman Project expanded, Democratic national security heavyweights including Jake Sullivan, Hillary Clinton’s foreign policy guru who ran the Department of Policy Planning during her tenure at Foggy Bottom; Matthew Spence, a Defense Department veteran who served as a senior aide to Obama national security adviser Tom Donilon; and Steve Israel, the former Democratic congressman and head of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, eventually joined Biden on the board.

Run for Office

A cached version of the organization’s website shows that Biden rose to the position of vice chairman of the board, serving there until at least March of 2019. It is not clear precisely when—or why—Biden stepped down from the board, and the Truman Project did not respond to requests for comment. But during his tenure on the board, according to the New Yorker, he was in and out of drug rehabilitation facilities several times and, in 2014, joined the board of the Ukrainian gas giant Burisma and was discharged from the U.S. Navy after he failed a drug test. He later claimed that cigarettes he had smoked outside a bar may have been, unbeknownst to him, laced with cocaine.

Founded in 2004 by Kleinfeld, a Yale University graduate and Rhodes Scholar, the Truman National Security Project was intended to mirror conservative think tanks like the Heritage Foundation and the American Enterprise Institute. Funded by the Ploughshares Fund, the organization awards dozens of fellowships every year and aims to mentor a new generation of Democratic foreign policy leaders.

(Sidebar: The Ploughshares Fund was a major funder promoting the Iran Nuclear deal and remember lil Ben Rhodes of the Obama White House later joined Ploughshares.)

Kleinfeld, who left the organization in 2013 and now serves as a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, did not respond to a request for comment. The Truman National Security Project did not return multiple requests for comment. A lawyer for Hunter Biden did not respond to a request for comment. A spokeswoman for John P. Driscoll, the chairman of the board of the Truman National Security Project, did not respond to a series of questions including why Biden was appointed to the board and when he stepped down from the position.

Kleinfeld has, however, written about her deep concern about corruption in Ukraine, writing in 2014, the year Biden joined Burisma’s board, that “Iraq’s fall on the heels of Ukraine’s collapse should be compelling. Curbing corruption before it tips into Kalashnikov-carrying rebels and public crucifixions is good security policy. And we need to get better at it.”

Biden was appointed to the Burisma board as the oil and gas giant faced a slew of corruption investigations involving its owner, Mikhail Zlochevsky, who was facing a money laundering investigation.

During Biden’s time on the board of the Truman Project, the organization joined a network of other left-leaning national-security oriented outlets with which it is closely linked, decried the Trump administration’s foreign policy initiatives and called for the resignation of Attorney General William Barr. Defend American Democracy, which identifies the Truman National Security Project as a “partner organization,” ran a national ad urging Americans to “hold the president accountable for abusing his office and risking national security for his own gain.”

Biden wasn’t the organization’s only connection to Burisma. Throughout his tenure on the board he sat alongside Sally Painter, the chief operating officer of the Washington, D.C., lobbying firm Blue Star Strategies, which was hired by Burisma to improve the company’s image in the United States. A November Wall Street Journal report detailed how Painter’s colleague, Karen Tramontano, used Biden’s name in an effort to secure meetings with senior State Department officials, though the paper said it was not clear “whether the younger Mr. Biden knew his name was being used by Blue Star in its contacts with State Department officials on Burisma’s behalf in early 2016.”

While it is unclear when, exactly, Burisma retained Blue Star Strategies, Biden and Painter were serving together on the Truman board while Blue Star was working for Burisma.

As a tax-exempt organization, the Truman National Security Project is required to file tax returns indicating whether any of its officers or key employees have a “business relationship” with any others. Though Burisma tapped Painter’s public relations outfit while Biden was a member of the board, the Truman Project answered “no.” It further indicated that its officers had been briefed on their duty to disclose any conflicts of interest and that it was “regularly and consistently” monitoring compliance with the policy.

Michael Breen, president and CEO of Human Rights First, who served as president and CEO of the Truman Project when the tax returns were filed, and who is identified on them as the individual who possesses the organization’s books and records, did not respond to phone calls or emails seeking comment.

Truman fellows can now be found throughout the D.C. foreign policy establishment. Former secretary of state Madeleine Albright; Senators Chris Coons (D., Del.), Tammy Duckworth (D., Ill.) and Kamala Harris (D., Calif.); and former undersecretary of defense for policy Michele Flournoy are board members of its sister organization, the Truman Center for National Policy.

The Truman National Security Project’s current president and CEO, Jenna Ben-Yehuda, whose contact information is not publicly listed on the organization’s website, did not respond to a request via Twitter for an appropriate point of contact for media inquiries. A page listing the group’s membership is “currently under construction,” according to the group’s website, and the email address listed for press inquiries was inoperative.

On Tuesday—even before his disappointing fifth place finish in New Hampshire—Joe Biden fled the state for South Carolina, where he is hoping African-American voters will revive his flagging campaign. If that hope proves futile, it will be in part because of the perception that, as vice president, Biden either used his name and influence to help friends and family or looked the other way while they did so at places like Burisma and the Truman National Security Project.

***

As of June 2017, it is composed of 16 chapters from 47 different states across the nation and claims more than 1,600 members. It supports American leadership, using its defense and diplomacy in the world on issues involving shared security and democracy promotion abroad. Many of its members are former or current military personnel, diplomats, foreign policy lobbyists, and political activists. The Truman Project has been criticized for giving the impression that it is bipartisan and independent while being supportive of the Democratic Party.

02/13/20

The Revolution Will Be Subsidized by Bloomberg

By: Cliff Kincaid

The apparent disagreements among the “centrist” and “radical” Democratic presidential candidates are not significant or substantial. In the end, they will unite and depend on Mike Bloomberg’s billions of dollars to take down President Trump. Mr. “Stop-and-Frisk” has already pledged $2 billion or more to do so. This makes Trump beatable.

If you don’t think money matters, look at Bloomberg’s rise in the polls based on millions of dollars of commercials alone.

Bloomberg is not a socialist but a technocrat prepared to usher in a socialist state. He wants to bring “Stop-and-Frisk” to all of us, on a nationwide basis. This means getting shoved up against a wall and losing our economic, political, and personal freedoms.

For his part, Bernie Sanders objects to Bloomberg buying an election. But he is referring to Bloomberg taking the Democratic presidential nomination away from him. You can bet that Bernie will not object to Bloomberg and/or George Soros buying the White House for the Democratic Party and its eventual nominee by running hundreds of millions of dollars of negative ads against Trump. These can make the difference.

At the current time, according to the publication Axios, “Amid record-high stock markets and record-low joblessness, Trump trails almost every 2020 Democrat nationally, and is in a statistical tie in swing-state polls.” This means that Trump needs every vote he can get.

In this context, there are growing numbers of people inclined to vote for Trump who are very concerned about the forces of Cultural Marxism. Also known as political correctness, Cultural Marxism is a societal sickness that permeates the media and which even includes such spectacles as a half-time NFL Super Bowl show featuring scantily clad pole dancers. This moral meltdown is just as much of a threat to America’s future as an economic collapse.

Opposition to this Marxist cultural agenda is what caused many traditional Democratic voters, especially from the working class, to vote for Trump. They are sick of the sexual minorities and hedonists dictating how we are supposed to think and act. They would like to return to the days when kids are raised by moms and dads to be boys and girls.

We witnessed these insidious forces in action on Tuesday when national media featured the news that a famous NBA basketball star declared that he has accepted his 12-year-old boy as a girl. The announcement first came on the television show hosted by popular entertainer Ellen DeGeneres, a lesbian who has been “married” to another woman. The NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt featured a long segment on this development, presenting the parents as enlightened people with the best interests of their “transgender” son/daughter at heart. An expert called it a “teaching moment” for the nation.

You are supposed to accept homosexual/transgender rights and abortion rights while embracing the legalization of mind-altering marijuana and giving up your gun rights. This lunacy is Cultural Marxism today. Bloomberg’s billions can bring it about.

Historically, Cultural Marxism originated with an Italian communist named Antonio Gramsci, who devised ways for Marxism to infiltrate and subvert Western culture, especially traditional Christian values. Various books, such as The Open Marxism of Antonio Gramsci, explain this strategy in detail. The book is a collection of Gramsci essays translated by Carl Marzani, a publisher and Soviet KGB agent whose publishing house was subsidized by the KGB. He introduced Gramsci’s writings to the United States in the mid-1950s.

It just so happens that Pete Buttigieg’s father was a Gramsci scholar.

At this critical juncture, author and filmmaker Trevor Loudon’s forthcoming book, White House Reds: Communists, Socialists & Security Risks Running for US President, 2020, examines the backgrounds of Buttigieg and the other Democratic Party candidates in detail. He notes, “Presidential candidates Pete Buttigieg and Bernie Sanders are currently fierce rivals in the race for the Democratic party nomination. However, not so many years ago Bernie Sanders was Pete Buttigieg’s ‘socialist’ hero.” He cites an essay the teenage Pete Buttigieg wrote in 2000 for the John F. Kennedy Library and Museum’s annual “Profiles in Courage” essay Competition.

Loudon comments, “In his essay the teenage Pete Buttigieg showed a good understanding of American politics and of the socialist project. No doubt aided by many conversations with his Marxist father around the dinner table.”

Loudon notes, “Both Pete Buttigieg and Bernie Sanders have a long association with the small ‘c’ communists of Democratic Socialists of America. Pete Buttigieg worked closely with local Marxists while serving as Mayor of South Bend Indiana. How then, can Pete Buttigieg claim to be the ‘moderate’ in the race?” Loudon’s important book, now available for pre-order, exposes Pete’s links to the “South Bend socialists” and other anti-American and anti-Israel causes.

In another significant development, Buttigieg, a pothead at Harvard, has emerged as an advocate of decriminalizing drugs such as heroin and LSD.

His campaign is a prime example of how Cultural Marxism distorts our understanding of what’s happening politically. We are constantly told he is a “centrist” or “moderate.” These are lies. Loudon documents how all of the Democratic presidential candidates are security risks based on various degrees of Marxist associations and loony left skeletons in their closets.

It really doesn’t matter if Bernie or Pete gets the nomination because they both have a deep understanding of how the forces that Gramsci wrote about are coalescing in the Democratic Party and attempting to complete the job that Barack Hussein Obama started. They can’t be underestimated, especially because of the billions of dollars backing them.

Keep in mind that Bloomberg is not just an isolated billionaire. He is a member of such high-level organizations as the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) and the Trilateral Commission. (His firm is a corporate member of the CFR). His website advertises his speech at the “One Planet Summit,” co-hosted by the United Nations, on the need to restructure global financial architecture, in the name of stopping climate change, and deindustrializing America.

In an authoritarian display, the 20,000 employees in his media business have been prohibited from writing a negative word about his candidacy.

Looking at the presidential race and the current popular figures, Trevor Loudon asks, “Is Pete Buttigieg rally just a well-meaning liberal Democrat who just wants the best for America? Or is he his father’s son? Is he actually a ‘stealth socialist’ who has honed the art of appearing to be whatever he needs to be to further his cause in any given situation?”

For his part, Buttigieg says, “I don’t think Trump can figure out what to do with me.” It’s not only because Mayor Pete is a closet socialist but an open gay.

This is a conundrum because Trump was pictured during the 2016 campaign holding up a rainbow flag inscribed with the phrase “LGBT for Trump.” To the dismay of his conservative supporters, he has followed through, as the Trump Administration is leading a pro-gay global diplomacy effort through the U.N. that is led by Trump’s gay Ambassador to Germany, Richard Grenell. Christian nations are being told by this “conservative” Administration that they have to legalize and celebrate the homosexual lifestyle.

If he doesn’t forcefully challenge the homosexual cabal eating away the moral fabric of the nation, Trump will make himself vulnerable to defeat in the 2020 election. It is his potential Achilles heel. He has to abandon the LGBT movement for the sake of the nation and his own re-election.

*Cliff Kincaid is president of America’s Survival, Inc. www.usasurvival.org

02/13/20

Chinese Spy Leading California Public Pension Fund?

By: Denise Simon | Founders Code

This may add some very new and different questions when it comes to the Biden foreign operations… read on.

Rep. Jim Banks, R-Ind., joined “Mornings with Maria” to explain why he wrote a letter to California Gov. Gavin Newsom highlighting his concerns about the state public pension fund’s chief investment officer having ties to China.

The fund has invested $3.1 billion in Chinese companies, some of which have been blacklisted by the U.S. government, Banks told FOX Business’ Maria Bartiromo.

“If this were up to me, I would fire [Chief Investment Officer Yu Ben Meng] immediately because of these suspicious ties,” he said. “We learned that Mr. Meng, who is the chief investment officer of CalPERS, was actually recruited to this position by the [Chinese Communist Party] through something called the Thousand Talents Program. Now he’s denied it.”

CalPERS stands for the California Public Employees’ Retirement System, the largest public pension fund in the nation.

“What is unusual is that many of these companies are companies that we’ve blacklisted, that make Chinese military equipment or are responsible for technologies like Hikvision, which is the equipment that’s used by the Chinese for surveillance on the Uighur Muslim population that they’ve been abusing in their own country,” Banks said.

The Commerce Department blacklisted Hikvision in October “for engaging in or enabling activities contrary to the foreign policy interests of the United States.”

CalPERS defended Meng.

“This is a reprehensible attack on a U.S. citizen. We fully stand behind our Chief Investment Officer who came to CalPERS with a stellar international reputation,” a CalPERS spokeswoman told Reuters.

China's Social Credit System – It's Coming To The United ...

Hold on, it is actually worse… going back 4 months ago…

(Reuters) – Some of the biggest public pensions funds in the United States have invested in one of the world’s largest purveyors of video surveillance systems that the U.S. government claims are used in wide-scale repression of the Muslim population of western China.

The Trump administration’s decision to put the company, Hangzhou Hikvision Digital Technology Co (002415.SZ), on a blacklist last week has prompted at least two of the pension plans to say they are reviewing or monitoring that development.

The blacklist applies to Hikvision and seven other companies because they allegedly enabled the crackdown that has led to mass arbitrary detentions in the Xinjiang region.

“We are tracking the situation given this new development with the Department of Commerce’s announcement,” a spokeswoman for the California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS) said in an email.

CalSTRS owned 4.35 million Hikvision shares at the end of June 30, 2018, the last data available. The holding, owned directly and through emerging market exchange-traded funds, would be worth $24 million at that share count.

The New York State Teachers Retirement System also owned Hikvision, reporting 81,802 shares at the end of June, up from 26,402 shares at the end of 2018, fund disclosures show.

“Our holdings are primarily held according to their weights in passive portfolios matching the MSCI ACWI ex-U.S. index, our policy benchmark. We are monitoring the situation,” said a spokesman for the teachers’ fund. The ex-U.S. All Country World Index includes stocks from 22 developed and emerging markets.

The blacklisting means Hikvision and the other companies will not be able to buy U.S. technology, such as software and microchips, without specific U.S. government approval. It does not prevent U.S. investors from buying the companies’ shares. In August, Hikvision had been banned from selling to U.S. federal agencies because the government said its products could allow access to sensitive systems.

Hikvision’s General Manager Hu Yangzhong told Reuters on Wednesday it has been talking to the U.S. government about Xinjiang and has hired human rights lawyers to defend itself against the blacklisting.

A spokeswoman for law firm Sidley Austin LLP, which has lobbied for Hikvision this year, declined to comment.

Another major fund investing in Hikvision shares is the Florida Retirement System (FRS), with 1.8 million shares at the end of June.

A spokesman for the fund said it was working closely with external money managers “related to the issue in order to meet all regulatory and fiduciary requirements.”

POSTER CHILD

Risk consultants say the ease with which money used for the retirements of tens of millions of Americans is being invested in such companies should concern U.S. authorities at every level, as well as Americans generally.

“Hikvision has emerged as the corporate poster child for enabling Chinese human rights abuses, with its surveillance cameras visible atop the walls of detention camps incarcerating some one million or more Uighurs in Xinjiang,” said Roger Robinson, president and CEO of Washington DC-based risk consultancy RWR Advisory Group.

Beijing denies any mistreatment of people at the camps, which it says provide vocational training to help stamp out religious extremism and teach new work skills.

Robinson said that many Americans are unwittingly owning shares in such companies because they are in index funds. “They are picked up by the index providers in sizable numbers and sluiced into U.S. investor portfolios with seemingly very little, if any, due diligence or disclosure in the categories of national security and human rights.”

MSCI Inc (MSCI.N), whose products are designed for global investors, added Hikvision to its benchmark emerging markets index last year. MSCI declined to comment.

One other company among the blacklisted eight that is owned by some of the big pension funds is iFlytek Co Ltd (002230.SZ), a speech-recognition firm. Its shares were owned by funds in Florida, New York State as well as CalSTRS and the California Public Employees Retirement System (CalPERS) indirectly through the iShares MSCI Emerging Markets ETF at their last disclosure dates. IShares, a top ETF provider owned by BlackRock Inc (BLK.N), declined to comment.

CUTTING TIES

Not all the funds have stuck with Hikvision.

The New York State Common Fund, one of the country’s biggest pension funds, liquidated its position months ago. It had owned 2.7 million shares worth $14.2 million at the end of March through an external fund manager, but sold them in May, a spokesman said, declining to say why.

U.S. mutual funds have also cut or eliminated positions in Hikvision amid the negative publicity, which included it being named in a Human Rights Watch report on mass surveillance in Xinjiang in May.

Just 9% of global emerging markets funds now own Hikvision, down from 20% in 2018, according to Copley Fund Research. One fund to pull out is the $2.7 billion Artisan Developing World Fund (APDYX.O), which had a $66 million position in Hikvision at the end of March but reported holding no shares three months later, fund disclosures show. Artisan did not respond to a request for comment.

At least one U.S. pension fund had worried this summer about whether to invest in the Chinese surveillance company.

The $33 billion Alaska Permanent Fund had considered an investment in a China fund featuring Hikvision as a top holding, according to minutes of a June meeting of its trustees and staff. The minutes were published last month.

Schroders Global Asset Management, a finalist for the fund’s mainland China investment mandate, touted Hikvision as a top performer.

Some Alaska trustees, however, worried about “headline risks” of investing in companies that aid the Chinese government’s surveillance activities, according to the minutes.

Jack Lee, portfolio manager of the China fund, assured Alaska pension officials he had spoken with Hikvision executives. Hikvision will “try to avoid that kind of business,” the trustees were told, but “they don’t necessarily know how their equipment is used,” Lee told the trustees, according to the minutes.

Reuters could not determine whether Alaska made an investment in the Schroders fund that included Hikvision stock.

A spokeswoman for the Alaska Retirement Management Board, which oversees the pension, said it does not have any additional information to share regarding Schroders’ efforts. A Schroders spokesman declined to comment.