The chairman of the newly established congressional select committee on the Chinese Communist Party, Representative Mike Gallagher, revealed two of the first witnesses that he would call to testify before the bipartisan panel. During an appearance on the Hugh Hewitt Show, he said Disney CEO Bob Iger and NBA commissioner Adam Silver would be the first witnesses.
Just in from @RepGallagher to me on air: @Disney’s Bob Iger and the @NBA’s Adam Silver will be called upon to testify before the Gallagher Committee stat.
— Hugh Hewitt (@hughhewitt) January 11, 2023
“Consider this me giving them the initial warning order that they’ll have to testify before the committee,” Gallagher said, adding that he’d “even be willing to go out” to “sit down with them where they are.”
Under Iger, Disney’s operations in China flourished, and the company shot a live-action remake of the film Mulan in Xinjiang, where Beijing is carrying out a campaign against Uyghurs. Silver has similarly defended the NBA’s business entanglements in China, and in 2019 he deleted a tweet that he had initially posted to defend Houston Rockets general manager Daryl Morey over his comments supporting Hong Kong’s pro-democracy movement.
Other hearings featuring prominent U.S. executives have garnered attention for those witnesses’ uncomfortable answers to questions from lawmakers about human rights in China. During one noteworthy hearing in 2021, several executives for companies that sponsored the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics dodged questions about the repression of Uyghurs.
Gallagher told host Hugh Hewitt that while it’s not clear whether his panel has subpoena power, he doesn’t anticipate facing any obstacles to getting witnesses to testify.