CNN Newsroom: Interview With Rep. Mike Quigley (D-IL)

Interview

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You know, it is, and let me just add, so much has been said about this. To a large extent, it just doesn't make sense at this time.

Clearly both nations are attempting to normalize relations with the presidents meeting, now Secretary Blinken meeting with his counterpart. It is conceivable that somehow the Chinese president wasn't aware of at least the timing of this. It doesn't minimize the severity and the brazen attempts to surveil our country, putting in perspective the fact that there are low earth Chinese satellites surveilling all of these areas almost on an hourly basis.

And so all that is extraordinarily serious. It has to be mitigated against. It's why a healthy intelligence community is so important. But just so much of this doesn't make sense for to happen at this particular time.

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Yes, I agree with my colleague, (INAUDIBLE) now, Mr. Hinds (ph). It's better to recover this and analyze it and see what we might learn about what the capabilities there are and how the Chinese are attempting to do this and rather than have spread over a long, long debris field.

So it made sense to not shoot this down until it was over the -- passed over the United States territory.

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Oh it's very concerning. All I'm saying is I think It's just as concerning that the satellites are up there. I think the only thing that might have been accidental is the president of China may not have known of the timing.

No, there is deliberate planning taking place by the Chinese government. In January, a grad student was sentenced to jail for six years in Chicago for spying on our scientists, our academics.

This is a very intense effort by the Chinese to spy on our government and our private sector, our military. This is important.

All I'm saying is it doesn't make sense that it's happening at this particular time with this brazen an effort when they are trying to normalize relations. And the concern would be that it is important for us to normalize these relations and this is going to send us in the exact opposite direction.

It doesn't benefit either country and it's a horrible mistake by the Chinese at this time.

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Well, the Chinese have sent balloons over the U.S. properties. It has happened before. So you know, we're aware of this. But doing it over -- you know, directly the middle of the continental United States, we're trying to understand this. Because what most -- most spying would tend to be attempt at covert in nature. This is something in which I think every American is aware of. It is not particularly effective.

So look, we are concerned about this. We are concerned about the surveillance efforts. All I'm adding I think the equation is the fact that I think the Chinese made a historically difficult and silly mistake at an extremely bad time.

So we have to mitigate against all the efforts the Chinese government is making to surveil our government, and it is obviously human intelligence, signal intelligence. This is just one that every American has been made aware of.

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Sure. Because look, this is flying at least twice the height of normal commercial aircraft, sometimes three or four times that. So who's going to do the calculus of when you actually shoot this down, how far it's going to travel before it lands somewhere.

And it is very likely that there is a lot of very heavy equipment in this. So I think what you do and the proper course of action was to mitigate against the surveillance that was taking place. The Department of Defense talked about doing that and is quite capable of doing that.

They've got a lot of experience. And once it gets into an area where it doesn't endanger Americans, you shoot it down, collect it and learn what you possibly can.

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I absolutely agree. I think that you engage in an ongoing basis. There's always room for diplomacy. And I just remind everyone, the opposite of diplomacy is something you don't want. We are seemingly in a sort of Cold War with the Chinese right now. And there are a lot to be worried about with the military aggression, surveillance like this, everything from TikTok to, you know, the human rights violations, we're all aware of.

We need to address these issues, reminding ourselves that these two governments' economies are incredibly intertwined. The impact on one affects the other. So there's always room for diplomacy. I understand the pressure they might have felt to postpone this trip but I agree with my colleague, Mr. Smith, that those discussions should continue as terse as they might be, and that ongoing diplomatic efforts with our allies to pressure China to act more appropriately are more effective when we are in China as well.

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Thank you.

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