IIB 
117TH CONGRESS 
2D SESSION 
H. R. 4821 
IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES 
OCTOBER 11, 2022 
Received; read twice and referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations 
AN ACT 
To hold accountable senior officials of the Government of 
the People’s Republic of China who are responsible for 
or have directly carried out, at any time, persecution 
of Christians or other religious minorities in China, and 
for other purposes. 
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 
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SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Combating the Perse-
cution of Religious Groups in China Act’’. 
SEC. 2. FINDINGS. 
Congress makes the following findings: 
(1) According to the Department of State’s 
International Religious Freedom (IRF) report esti-
mates, Buddhists comprise 18.2 percent of the coun-
try’s total population, Christians, 5.1 percent, Mus-
lims, 1.8 percent, followers of folk religions, 21.9 
percent, and atheists or unaffiliated persons, 52.2 
percent, with Hindus, Jews, and Taoists comprising 
less than one percent. 
(2) The Government of the People’s Republic of 
China (PRC) recognizes five official religions, Bud-
dhism, Taoism, Islam, Protestantism, and Catholi-
cism (according to the State Department’s IRF re-
port) and only religious groups belonging to one of 
the five sanctioned ‘‘patriotic religious associations’’ 
representing these religions are permitted to register 
with the government and hold worship service, ex-
cluding all other faiths and denying the ability to 
worship without being registered with the govern-
ment. 
(3) The activities of state-sanctioned religious 
organizations are regulated by the Chinese Com-
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munist Party, which manages all aspects of religious 
life. 
(4) The Chinese Communist Party is actively 
seeking to control, govern, and manipulate all as-
pects of faith through the ‘‘Sinicization of Religion’’, 
a process intended to shape religious traditions and 
doctrines so they conform with the objectives of the 
Chinese Communist Party. 
(5) On February 1, 2018, the PRC Government 
implemented new religious regulations that imposed 
restrictions on Chinese contacts with overseas reli-
gious organizations, required government approval 
for religious schools, websites, and any online reli-
gious service, and effectively banned unauthorized 
religious gatherings and teachings. 
(6) There are numerous reports that authorities 
forced closures of Buddhist, Christian, Islamic, and 
Taoist houses of worship and destroyed public dis-
plays of religious symbols throughout the country. 
(7) Authorities arrested and detained religious 
leaders trying to hold services online. 
(8) There are credible reports of Chinese au-
thorities raiding house churches and other places of 
religious worship, removing and confiscating reli-
gious paraphernalia, installing surveillance cameras 
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on religious property, pressuring congregations to 
sing songs of the Chinese Communist Party and dis-
play the national flag during worship, forcing 
churches to replace images of Jesus Christ or the 
Virgin Mary with pictures of General Secretary Xi 
Jinping, and banning children and students from at-
tending religious services. 
(9) It has been reported that the PRC is rewrit-
ing and will issue a version of the Bible with the 
‘‘correct understanding’’ of the text according to the 
Chinese Communist Party. Authorities continued to 
restrict the printing and distribution of the Bible, 
Quran, and other religious literature, and penalized 
publishing and copying businesses that handled reli-
gious materials. 
(10) According to the Department of State’s 
IRF reports, the PRC Government has imprisoned 
thousands of individuals of all faiths for practicing 
their religious beliefs and often labels them as 
‘‘cults’’. 
(11) The Political Prisoner Database main-
tained by the human rights NGO Dui Hua Founda-
tion counted 3,492 individuals imprisoned for ‘‘orga-
nizing or using a ‘cult’ to undermine implementation 
of the law.’’ Prisoners include— 
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(A) the 11th Panchen Lama, Gedun 
Choekyi Nyima, who has been held captive 
along with his parents since May 17, 1995; 
(B) Pastor Zhang Shaojie, a Three-Self 
church pastor from Nanle County in central 
Henan was sentenced in July 2014 to 12 years 
in prison for ‘‘gathering a crowd to disrupt the 
public order’’; 
(C) Pastor John Cao, a United States per-
manent resident from Greensboro, North Caro-
lina, who was sentenced for 7 years in prison in 
March 2018 under contrived charges of orga-
nizing illegal border crossings; and 
(D) Pastor Wang Yi of the Early Rain 
Covenant Church who was arrested and sen-
tenced to 9 years in prison for ‘‘inciting to sub-
vert state power’’ and ‘‘illegal business oper-
ations’’. 
(12) Authorities continue to detain Falun Gong 
practitioners and subject them to harsh and inhu-
mane treatment. 
(13) Since 1999, the Department of State has 
designated the PRC as a country of particular con-
cern under the International Religious Freedom Act 
of 1998. 
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(14) The National Security Strategy of the 
United States, issued in 2017, 2015, 2006, 2002, 
1999, 1998, and 1997, committed the United States 
to promoting international religious freedom to ad-
vance the security, economic, and other national in-
terests of the United States. 
SEC. 3. STATEMENT OF POLICY. 
(a) HOLDING PRC OFFICIALS RESPONSIBLE FOR 
RELIGIOUS
FREEDOM
ABUSES
TARGETING
CHINESE 
CHRISTIANS OR OTHER RELIGIOUS MINORITIES.—It is 
the policy of the United States to consider senior officials 
of the Government of the People’s Republic of China 
(PRC) who are responsible for or have directly carried out, 
at any time, persecution of Christians or other religious 
minorities in the PRC to have committed— 
(1) a gross violation of internationally recog-
nized human rights for purposes of imposing sanc-
tions with respect to such officials under the Global 
Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act (22 
U.S.C. 2656 note); and 
(2) a particularly severe violation of religious 
freedom 
for 
purposes 
of 
applying 
section 
212(a)(2)(G) of the Immigration and Nationality 
Act (8 U.S.C. 1182(a)(2)(G)) with respect to such 
officials. 
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(b) DEPARTMENT OF STATE PROGRAMMING TO PRO-
MOTE RELIGIOUS FREEDOM IN THE PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC 
OF CHINA.—The Ambassador-at-Large for International 
Religious Freedom should support efforts to protect and 
promote international religious freedom in the PRC and 
for programs to protect Christians and other religious mi-
norities in the PRC. 
(c) DESIGNATION OF THE PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC OF 
CHINA AS A COUNTRY OF PARTICULAR CONCERN.—It is 
the policy of the United States to continue to designate 
the PRC as a ‘‘country of particular concern’’, as long 
as the PRC continues to engage in systematic and egre-
gious religious freedom violations, as defined by the Inter-
national Religious Freedom Act of 1998 (Public Law 105– 
292). 
SEC. 4. SENSE OF CONGRESS. 
It is the sense of Congress that the United States 
should promote religious freedom in the PRC by— 
(1) strengthening religious freedom diplomacy 
on behalf of Christians and other religious minorities 
facing restrictions in the PRC; 
(2) raising cases relating to religious or political 
prisoners at the highest levels with PRC officials be-
cause experience demonstrates that consistently rais-
ing prisoner cases can result in improved treatment, 
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reduced sentences, or in some cases, release from 
custody, detention, or imprisonment; 
(3) encouraging Members of Congress to 
‘‘adopt’’ a prisoner of conscience in the PRC 
through the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commis-
sion’s ‘‘Defending Freedom Project’’, raise the case 
with PRC officials, and work publicly for their re-
lease; 
(4) calling on the PRC Government to uncondi-
tionally release religious and political prisoners or, at 
the very least, ensure that detainees are treated hu-
manely with access to family, the lawyer of their 
choice, independent medical care, and the ability to 
practice their faith while in detention; 
(5) encouraging the global faith community to 
speak in solidarity with the persecuted religious 
groups in the PRC; and 
(6) hosting, once every two years, the Ministe-
rial to Advance Religious Freedom organized by the 
Department of State in order to bring together lead-
ers from around the world to discuss the challenges 
facing religious freedom, identify means to address 
religious persecution and discrimination worldwide, 
and promote great respect for and preservation of 
religious liberty. 
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SEC. 5. SENSE OF CONGRESS REGARDING ACTIONS AT 
UNITED NATIONS. 
It is the sense of Congress that the United Nations 
Human Rights Council should issue a formal condemna-
tion of the People’s Republic of China for the ongoing 
genocide against Uyghurs and other religious and ethnic 
minority groups, as well as for its persecution of Chris-
tians, Falun Gong, and other religious groups. 
Passed the House of Representatives September 29, 
2022. 
Attest: 
CHERYL L. JOHNSON, 
Clerk. 
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