democracy advocates claim that the Governments of 
the People’s Republic of China and Hong Kong have 
assembled ‘‘blacklists’’ of activists banned from en-
tering mainland China. 
(11) Several prominent student leaders, includ-
ing Joshua Wong, leader of the now dissolved stu-
dent activist group Scholarism and Secretary-Gen-
eral of the political party Demosisto, Nathan Law, 
former General Secretary of the Hong Kong Federa-
tion of Students and current member of the Legisla-
tive Council, and Alex Chow, the former General 
Secretary of the Hong Kong Federation of Students, 
had legal charges levied against them due to their 
participation in pro-democracy protest activities in 
September 2014. Wong and Chow were convicted of 
‘‘unlawful assembly’’ while Law was convicted of 
‘‘incitement,’’ offenses under Hong Kong’s Public 
Order Ordinance, which is incompatible with inter-
national standards on the freedom of assembly. 
(12) Ahead of the September 2016 Legislative 
Council election, the Electoral Affairs Commission in 
Hong Kong issued a new ‘‘confirmation form’’ for 
LegCo candidates to sign confirming their commit-
ment to uphold the Basic Law, specifically that the 
territory is an inalienable part of China. Six pro- 
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independence candidates were disqualified for failing 
to do so. This new requirement has been character-
ized as unlawful and political censorship by lawyers, 
political organizations, and students. 
(13) Following the September 2016 Legislative 
Council elections, the Hong Kong government filed 
a lawsuit to remove from office two newly-elected 
pro-democracy lawmakers, arguing that the alter-
ations they made to their oaths of office rendered 
those oaths invalid. 
(14) On November 7, 2016, the NPCSC inter-
vened in the pending court case, issuing an interpre-
tation of article 104 of Hong Kong’s Basic Law 
which found that oaths of office would be invalid un-
less delivered ‘‘sincerely and solemnly.’’ Following 
the NPCSC interpretation, the two lawmakers were 
removed from office by a Hong Kong court. 
(15) In December 2016, the Hong Kong gov-
ernment filed a lawsuit against four other pro-de-
mocracy lawmakers, seeking to disqualify and re-
move them from office for impermissibly altering 
their oaths. 
(16) Five individuals affiliated with the Mighty 
Current Publishing House and the Causeway Bay 
Bookstore, both of which are based in Hong Kong 
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and sell literary works critical of Beijing, dis-
appeared under mysterious circumstances between 
October and December 2015, including Gui Minhai, 
a naturalized Swedish citizen and co-owner of 
Mighty Current; Lee Bo, a British citizen and co- 
owner of Mighty Current; Lui Bo; Cheung Chi-ping; 
and Lam Wing-kee. 
(17) Upon his return to Hong Kong in June 
2016, Lam publicly revealed details of his and other 
booksellers’ detentions, including their forced confes-
sions alleging that the abductions and detentions 
were directed by Chinese central government offi-
cials. 
(18) Despite Lee’s denial that he was abducted 
and the televised confessions of the other four, the 
five men’s disappearances have been widely con-
demned by human rights organizations and foreign 
officials and have resulted in allegations of mainland 
China’s law enforcement agencies operating in Hong 
Kong, which would be a violation of the Basic Law. 
(19) In February 2016, the British Foreign 
Secretary said Lee Bo’s involuntary removal to 
mainland China ‘‘constitute[d] a serious breach of 
the Sino-British Joint Declaration that paved the 
way for Hong Kong’s 1997 return to China. As part 
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of the treaty, China promised to safeguard Hong 
Kong’s freedoms.’’ 
(20) As China’s use of public ‘‘confessions’’ has 
expanded, several Hong Kong media outlets have 
been the medium whereby prominent rights defend-
ers and lawyers, including Wang Yu and Zhao Wei, 
have ‘‘confessed’’ to their alleged crimes. 
(21) The United States enjoys close economic, 
social, and cultural ties with Hong Kong. According 
to the Department of State, 60,000 United States 
citizens live in Hong Kong, and 1,400 United States 
businesses have offices there. According to the Office 
of the United States Trade Representative, Hong 
Kong is the United States 18th largest trade part-
ner and 10th largest export market for United 
States goods. 
(22) Hong Kong’s unique status as an inter-
national finance center where the rule of law and the 
rights and freedoms of its citizens are protected has 
served as the foundation for Hong Kong’s stability 
and prosperity. 
(23) Section 301 of the Hong Kong Policy Act 
of 1992 (22 U.S.C. 5731) required the Secretary of 
State to issue reports on conditions in Hong Kong 
of interest to the United States, including the devel-
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opment of democratic institutions in Hong Kong, 
and the last report under section 301 was issued on 
June 30, 2007. 
(24) Failure to establish a genuine democratic 
option to nominate and elect the Chief Executive of 
Hong Kong by 2017 and to establish open and di-
rect democratic elections for all members of the 
Hong Kong Legislative Council by 2020 would re-
duce confidence in the commitment of the Govern-
ment of the People’s Republic of China to uphold its 
obligations under international law, and would erode 
the ability of Hong Kong to retain a high degree of 
autonomy. 
(25) During an October 2014 session, the 
United Nations Human Rights Committee, con-
sisting of 18 independent experts, reviewed China’s 
compliance with the International Covenant on Civil 
and Political Rights with respect to Hong Kong. Ac-
cording to the session’s chair, the Committee agreed 
on ‘‘the need to ensure universal suffrage, which 
means both the right to be elected as well as the 
right to vote. The main concerns of Committee 
members were focused on the right to stand for elec-
tions without unreasonable restrictions.’’ Another 
Committee member said that the ‘‘committee doesn’t 
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want candidates filtered. The problem is that Beijing 
wants to vet candidates.’’ 
(26) The Congressional-Executive Commission 
on China’s 2015 Annual Report ‘‘observed develop-
ments raising concerns that the Chinese and Hong 
Kong governments may have infringed on the rights 
of the people of Hong Kong, including in the areas 
of political participation and democratic reform, 
press freedom, and freedom of assembly.’’ 
(27) The Congressional-Executive Commission 
on China’s 2016 Annual Report found that ‘‘the 
growing influence of the Chinese central government 
and communist party and suspected activity by Chi-
nese authorities in Hong Kong—notably the dis-
appearance, alleged abduction, and detention in 
mainland China of five Hong Kong booksellers— 
raised fears regarding Hong Kong’s autonomy with-
in China as guaranteed under the ‘one country, two 
systems’ policy enshrined in the Basic Law, which 
prohibits mainland Chinese authorities from inter-
fering in Hong Kong’’. 
(28) A Hong Kong Journalists Association 
(HKJA) survey on press freedom found that 85 per-
cent of journalists believed press freedom had dete-
riorated in 2015. 
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(29) Hong Kong ranked 69th among 180 coun-
tries in Reporters Without Borders’ 2016 World 
Press Freedom Index, down eight places in just two 
years and marking a significant decline from 2002, 
when Hong Kong ranked 18th. 
(30) Freedom House’s 2015 Freedom of the 
Press Report found a five-year decline in press free-
dom in Hong Kong marked by an increase in phys-
ical attacks against journalists, cyberattacks crip-
pling widely read news sites at politically sensitive 
moments, and businesses withdrawing advertising 
from outlets that were critical of Beijing and sup-
portive of prodemocracy protestors. 
SEC. 4. STATEMENT OF POLICY. 
It is the policy of the United States— 
(1) to reaffirm the principles and objectives set 
forth in the United States-Hong Kong Policy Act of 
1992, namely that— 
(A) the United States has ‘‘a strong inter-
est in the continued vitality, prosperity, and 
stability of Hong Kong’’; 
(B) ‘‘support for democratization is a fun-
damental principle of United States foreign pol-
icy’’; 
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(C) ‘‘the human rights of the people of 
Hong Kong are of great importance to the 
United States and are directly relevant to 
United States interests in Hong Kong’’; 
(D) human rights ‘‘serve as a basis for 
Hong Kong’s continued economic prosperity’’; 
and 
(E) Hong Kong must remain sufficiently 
autonomous from the People’s Republic of 
China to justify a different treatment under a 
particular law of the United States, or any pro-
vision thereof, from that accorded the People’s 
Republic of China; 
(2) to support the democratic aspirations of the 
people of Hong Kong, as guaranteed to them by the 
Joint Declaration, the Basic Law, the International 
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and the Uni-
versal Declaration of Human Rights; 
(3) to urge the Government of the People’s Re-
public of China to uphold its commitments to Hong 
Kong, including allowing the people of Hong Kong 
to rule Hong Kong with a high degree of autonomy 
and without undue interference, and ensuring that 
Hong Kong voters freely enjoy the right to elect the 
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Chief Executive and all members of the Hong Kong 
Legislative Council by universal suffrage; 
(4) to support the establishment by 2017 of a 
genuine democratic option to freely and fairly nomi-
nate and elect the Chief Executive of Hong Kong, 
and the establishment by 2020 of open and direct 
democratic elections for all members of the Hong 
Kong Legislative Council; 
(5) to support the robust exercise by residents 
of Hong Kong of the rights to free speech and the 
press as guaranteed to them by the Basic Law and 
the Joint Declaration; 
(6) to ensure that all residents of Hong Kong 
are afforded freedom from arbitrary or unlawful ar-
rest, detention, or imprisonment as guaranteed to 
them by the Basic Law and the Joint Declaration; 
and 
(7) to draw international attention to any viola-
tions by the Government of the People’s Republic of 
China of the fundamental rights of residents of 
Hong Kong and any encroachment upon the auton-
omy guaranteed to Hong Kong by the Basic Law 
and the Joint Declaration. 
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SEC. 5. REINSTATEMENT OF REPORTING REQUIREMENTS 
RELATED TO UNITED STATES-HONG KONG 
RELATIONS. 
(a) IN GENERAL.—Section 301 of the United States- 
Hong Kong Policy Act of 1992 (22 U.S.C. 5731) is 
amended— 
(1) by striking ‘‘Not later than’’ and all that 
follows through ‘‘the Secretary of State’’ and insert-
ing ‘‘Not later than 90 days after the date of the en-
actment of the Hong Kong Human Rights and De-
mocracy Act of 2017 and annually thereafter 
through 2023,’’; 
(2) by striking ‘‘Speaker of the House of Rep-
resentatives’’ and inserting ‘‘chairman of the Com-
mittee on Foreign Affairs of the House of Rep-
resentatives’’; 
(3) in paragraph (7), by striking ‘‘; and’’ and 
inserting a semicolon; 
(4) in paragraph (8), by striking the period at 
the end and inserting ‘‘; and’’; and 
(5) by adding at the end the following new 
paragraph: 
‘‘(9) matters in which Hong Kong is given sep-
arate treatment under the laws of the United States 
from that accorded to the People’s Republic of 
China and in accordance with this Act.’’. 
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(b) FORM.—The report required under section 301 
of the United States-Hong Kong Policy Act of 1992 (22 
U.S.C. 5731), as amended by subsection (a), should be 
unclassified and made publicly available, including 
through the Department of State’s public website. 
SEC. 6. TREATMENT OF HONG KONG UNDER UNITED 
STATES LAW. 
Title II of the United States-Hong Kong Policy Act 
of 1992 (22 U.S.C. 5721 et seq.) is amended by inserting 
after section 202 the following new section: 
‘‘SEC. 202a. TREATMENT OF HONG KONG UNDER UNITED 
STATES LAW. 
‘‘(a) SECRETARY
OF STATE CERTIFICATION RE-
QUIREMENT.— 
‘‘(1) IN
GENERAL.—Not later than 90 days 
after the date of the enactment of the Hong Kong 
Human Rights and Democracy Act of 2017, and an-
nually thereafter, the Secretary of State shall certify 
to Congress whether Hong Kong is sufficiently au-
tonomous to justify separate treatment under a par-
ticular law of the United States, or any provision 
thereof, different from that accorded the People’s 
Republic of China in any new laws, agreements, 
treaties, or arrangements entered into between the 
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United States and Hong Kong after the date of the 
enactment of such Act. 
‘‘(2) FACTOR FOR CONSIDERATION.—In making 
a certification under paragraph (1), the Secretary of 
State should consider the terms, obligations, and ex-
pectations expressed in the Joint Declaration with 
respect to Hong Kong. 
‘‘(b) WAIVER AUTHORITY.—The Secretary of State 
may waive the application of subsection (a) if the Sec-
retary— 
‘‘(1) determines that such a waiver is in the na-
tional security interests of the United States; and 
‘‘(2) on or before the date on which the waiver 
takes effect, submits to the Committee on Foreign 
Relations of the Senate and the Committee on For-
eign Affairs of the House of Representatives a notice 
of and justification for the waiver.’’. 
SEC. 7. IDENTIFICATION OF PERSONS RESPONSIBLE FOR 
THE ABDUCTION OF CERTAIN BOOKSELLERS 
AND JOURNALISTS IN HONG KONG AND FOR 
OTHER ACTIONS TO SUPPRESS BASIC FREE-
DOMS IN HONG KONG. 
(a) IN GENERAL.—Not later than 180 days after the 
date of the enactment of this Act, the President shall sub-
mit to the appropriate congressional committees a list of 
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each person that the President determines, based on cred-
ible information— 
(1) is responsible for the surveillance, abduc-
tion, detention, abuse, or forced confession of Gui 
Minhai, Lee Bo, Lam Wing-kee, Lui Bo, or Cheung 
Chi-ping, all of whom are involved in the operation 
of the Mighty Current Publishing House based in 
Hong Kong; 
(2) is responsible for the surveillance, abduc-
tion, detention, abuse, or forced confession of Guo 
Zhongxiao or Wang Jianmin, both of whom are in-
volved in the operation of magazine publications 
based in Hong Kong; or 
(3) is responsible for the surveillance, abduc-
tion, detention, abuse, or forced confession of any 
other journalist, publisher, writer, bookseller, or 
other resident in Hong Kong in connection with the 
exercise by that individual of the right to freedom of 
speech, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, 
freedom of association, and freedom of religion. 
(b) UPDATES.—The President shall submit to the ap-
propriate congressional committees an update of the list 
required by subsection (a) as new information becomes 
available. 
(c) FORM.— 
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(1) IN GENERAL.—The list required by sub-
section (a) shall be submitted in unclassified form. 
(2) EXCEPTION.—The name of a person to be 
included in the list required by subsection (a) may 
be submitted in a classified annex only if the Presi-
dent— 
(A) determines that it is vital for the na-
tional security interests of the United States to 
do so; 
(B) uses the annex in such a manner con-
sistent with congressional intent and the pur-
poses of this Act; and 
(C) 15 days before submitting the name in 
a classified annex, provides to the appropriate 
congressional committees notice of, and a jus-
tification for, including or continuing to include 
each person in the classified annex despite any 
publicly available credible information indi-
cating that the person engaged in an activity 
described in paragraph (1), (2), or (3) of sub-
section (a). 
(3) CONSIDERATION
OF
DATA
FROM
OTHER 
COUNTRIES
AND
NONGOVERNMENTAL
ORGANIZA-
TIONS.—In preparing the list required by subsection 
(a), the President shall consider information pro-
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vided by the chairperson and ranking member of 
each of the appropriate congressional committees 
and credible data obtained by other countries and 
nongovernmental organizations, including organiza-
tions inside the People’s Republic of China or Hong 
Kong, that monitor the human rights abuses of the 
Government of the People’s Republic of China or its 
associates or agents. 
(4) PUBLIC
AVAILABILITY.—The unclassified 
portion of the list required by subsection (a) shall be 
made available to the public and published in the 
Federal Register. 
(d) REMOVAL FROM LIST.—A person may be re-
moved from the list required by subsection (a) if the Presi-
dent determines and reports to the appropriate congres-
sional committees not later than 15 days before the re-
moval of the person from the list that— 
(1) credible information exists that the person 
did not engage in the activity for which the person 
was added to the list; 
(2) the person has been prosecuted appro-
priately for the activity in which the person engaged; 
or 
(3) the person has credibly demonstrated a sig-
nificant change in behavior, has paid an appropriate 
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consequence for the activities in which the person 
engaged, and has credibly committed to not engage 
in the types of activities specified in paragraphs (1) 
through (3) of subsection (a). 
(e) REQUESTS
BY CHAIRPERSON
AND RANKING 
MEMBER
OF APPROPRIATE CONGRESSIONAL COMMIT-
TEES.— 
(1) IN
GENERAL.—Not later than 120 days 
after receiving a written request from the chair-
person or ranking member of one of the appropriate 
congressional committees with respect to whether a 
person meets the criteria for being added to the list 
required by subsection (a), the President shall sub-
mit a response to the chairperson and ranking mem-
ber of the committee which made the request with 
respect to the status of the person. 
(2) FORM.—The President may submit a re-
sponse required by paragraph (1) in classified form 
if the President determines that it is vital for the 
national security interests of the United States to do 
so. 
(3) REMOVAL.—If the President removes from 
the list required by subsection (a) a person who has 
been placed on the list at the request of the chair-
person and ranking member of one of the appro-
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