I 
117TH CONGRESS 
1ST SESSION H. R. 4080 
To impose additional duties on imports of goods from the People’s Republic 
of China until China provides full compensation and reimbursement relat-
ing to the COVID–19 pandemic to the United States, and for other 
purposes. 
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
JUNE 23, 2021 
Mr. BROOKS (for himself, Mr. DESJARLAIS, and Mr. CAWTHORN) introduced 
the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Ways and 
Means, and in addition to the Committees on the Judiciary, and Foreign 
Affairs, for a period to be subsequently determined by the Speaker, in 
each case for consideration of such provisions as fall within the jurisdic-
tion of the committee concerned 
A BILL 
To impose additional duties on imports of goods from the 
People’s Republic of China until China provides full com-
pensation and reimbursement relating to the COVID– 
19 pandemic to the United States, and for other pur-
poses. 
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘China COVID–19 Res-
titution Act’’. 
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SEC. 2. FINDINGS AND SENSE OF CONGRESS. 
(a) FINDINGS.—Congress finds the following: 
(1) In April 2012, six miners assigned to clear 
bat guano from the Mojiang coal mine in Mojiang, 
Yunnan, China fell ill and 3 of them died. A team 
of scientists from the Wuhan Institute of Virology 
were called in to take samples of bats and found 
multiple new coronaviruses. 
(2) Scientists at the Wuhan Institute of Virol-
ogy did not announce the existence of the new 
coronaviruses nor their connections to the coal mine 
and the miners that became ill until 2021. 
(3) Dr. Shi Zhengli, lead scientist at Wuhan In-
stitute of Virology, described experiments to World 
Health Organization (WHO) scientists that could be 
described as gain of function research. These experi-
ments included manipulating certain spike proteins 
from coronaviruses found in bats and making them 
capable of infecting human cells. 
(4) The Wuhan Institute of Virology has been 
conducting experiments on a coronavirus identified 
as RaTG13, which was among the viruses found in 
the Mojiang mineshaft. 
(5) The Wuhan Institute of Virology has identi-
fied RaTG13 to be the most similar to SARS–CoV– 
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2, the virus that causes COVID–19 with a 96.2 per-
cent similarity. 
(6) In November 2019 three scientists at the 
Wuhan Institute of Virology became ill ‘‘with symp-
toms consistent with both COVID–19 and common 
seasonal illness’’. All 3 scientists sought treatment 
at a hospital. 
(7) A lab leak would not be unprecedented in 
China. In 2004, a SARS outbreak stemming from 2 
scientists at the Chinese Institute of Virology in Bei-
jing infected 9 people and killed one. 
(8) China refused to allow scientists to inves-
tigate the potential origins of COVID–19 until Jan-
uary 2021, more than a year after COVID–19 began 
its spread. 
(9) China only agreed to a WHO investigation 
if it had veto power over the scientists chosen for the 
trip and privilege to review and edit the final report 
before release. Thirty to sixty members of the Chi-
nese participants were not scientists. 
(10) China would not allow the international 
team access to blood bank samples, raw data of any 
kind, lab logs, lab biosafety requirements, or to 
interview staff members. 
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(11) The WHO team was required to remain 
separate from Chinese scientists unless in approved 
settings and were allowed only 3 hours inside the 
Wuhan lab under strict conditions. 
(12) Chinese scientists examined the medical 
records of 76,000 people in a province of nearly 60 
million people. Of that 76,000, only 92 were chosen 
to be tested for COVID–19 antibodies long after 
they could have faded and without any explanation 
to the WHO team of the criterion in which they 
were chosen. 
(13) The COVID–19 pandemic, whether natu-
rally occurring or not, was made worse due to the 
lies and misinformation promulgated by the Chinese 
Communist Party (CCP). 
(14) On January 3, 2020, China’s National 
Health Commission ordered medical institutions and 
labs not to publish any information about the new 
virus without specific government approval. The no-
tice also ordered labs to destroy their samples or 
send them to other designated institutions. 
(15) Even after the CCP knowingly delayed no-
tifying the world of the COVID–19 virus and did not 
share the genome sequence until January 11, 2020, 
the WHO repeatedly defended them. 
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(16) For weeks after various physicians in 
Wuhan warned of the possibility of human-to-human 
transmission, China refused to admit any such cases 
existed, as reported by the BBC. 
(17) Dr. Li Wenliang and eight other doctors 
warned of the dangers of the new virus in December 
2019. 
(18) In January 2020, the doctors were sum-
moned by the Public Security Bureau and silenced. 
(19) On January 14, 2020, the WHO tweeted 
‘‘preliminary investigations conducted by China have 
found no clear evidence of human-to-human trans-
mission’’. 
(20) On January 30, 2020, the WHO finally 
declares the outbreak to be a global health emer-
gency. 
(21) On February 24, 2020, following a 9-day 
field excursion in China, a joint team of CCP and 
WHO scientists held a news conference in which the 
WHO stated China’s actions slowed the spread of 
the epidemic and prevented or delayed thousands of 
cases. 
(22) On February 28, 2020, the joint team 
praised China for the ‘‘remarkable speed’’ of their 
response in isolating the virus. 
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(23) Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the 
WHO’s director-general, visited China and praised 
the country’s leadership for ‘‘setting a new standard 
for outbreak response’’. Another month and a half 
went by before the WHO called COVID–19 a pan-
demic, at which point the virus had killed more than 
4,000 people and had infected 118,000 people across 
nearly every continent. 
(b) SENSE OF CONGRESS.—It is the sense of Con-
gress that the People’s Republic of China and the CCP 
are fully responsible and liable for all deaths, injuries, and 
financial losses suffered in the United States by reason 
of the spread of COVID–19. 
SEC. 3. IMPOSITION OF ADDITIONAL DUTIES ON IMPORTS 
OF GOODS AND COMPONENTS FROM THE 
PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC OF CHINA. 
(a) IN GENERAL.—Subject to subsection (c), the 
President shall— 
(1) impose a duty on imports of any good from 
the People’s Republic of China, and any component 
manufactured in the People’s Republic of China that 
is incorporated in any good imported from any other 
country, in an amount equal to 10 percent ad valo-
rem of the good or component for the period begin-
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