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Jeffrey Ngo 敖卓軒 Profile picture
@jeffreychngo
Sep 14, 2020 • 7 tweets • 5 min read • Read on X
1. Plenty of people put in plenty of effort to help these #HongKong-related laws — which you may or may not like — materialize. Since you asked, let me answer. Congress first introduced the #HKHRDA amid the Umbrella Movement, when it received zero attention from @BarackObama.
2. Never from 2014 to 2018 had it even moved out of committee in either chamber. Yes, it passed the Senate last fall when no one denied @marcorubio’s request for unanimous consent, but he took a while to defeat closed-door special interests before he could bring it to the floor.
3. @SpeakerPelosi chose another path, insisting on a roll call so whoever dared to oppose it must do so on the record. This was how the 417-1 House landslide happened. Despite these supermajorities, @realDonaldTrump was ambiguous until the last minute.
4. The PROTECT Hong Kong Act, which bans the export of U.S.-made weapons to the H.K.P.F., was spearheaded chiefly by progressives like @RepMcGovern, @RepRoKhanna, @SenJeffMerkley, and @SenMarkey in urgent response to the summer violence. They pulled many strings to fast-track it.
5. Meanwhile, the Hong Kong Autonomy Act had far less input from folks like me. @SenToomey of the Banking Committee authored it, just to be held up by another Republican, @SenKevinCramer. I heard the rumor that orders came from the White House, yet this wasn’t public knowledge.
6. Only after @politico broke the scandal, causing an uproar in Washington, was it able to move. Overall, the executive and legislative branches were quite divided, both internally and with each other, on Hong Kong. Things could’ve gone in any direction.
7. What I’m trying to convey is that, as someone who has been intensely involved with these episodes over the years, I know nothing is inevitable. There’s opposition left and right. Hong Kongers’ strength and courage have changed some important minds, so yes, we do have agency.

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More from @jeffreychngo

Jeffrey Ngo 敖卓軒 Profile picture
Mar 13, 2023
1. There are two fundamentally divergent ways to interpret the triumph of Asians and Asian-Americans at the #Oscars in 2023, not in terms of racial relations in this country, on which I’m sure many people will comment, but in terms of #HongKong’s fight for democracy and autonomy.
2. On one hand, you have a vision promoted by the likes of @janetyang1. Educated at elite institutions here — Phillips Exeter Academy, followed by Brown and Columbia Universities — she climbed every step of Hollywood’s ladder by profiting from authoritarianism abroad.
3. In addition to repeatedly praising Chairman Xi Jinping, she leverages her skin color as a minority in the U.S. to dismiss genocidal policies in China, where her ethnicity — Han — empowers her. She exploits this gap across borders to play both sides against the middle.
Read 22 tweets
Jeffrey Ngo 敖卓軒 Profile picture
Apr 20, 2021
1. Yesterday, I moderated a panel at the #HKDC2021 on U.S. immigration policy for Hong Kongers, featuring @JohnCornyn, @BrianLeungKP, @JennyYangWR, @hannahsong, and @LouisaCGreve. I said the topic at hand was of both personal and intellectual significance to me. Here’s more.
2. Beyond my political activism — as many of you know — my Ph.D. research is on the international history of the Vietnamese boat people, with #HongKong at the center. One of the most important characters in my narrative just passed away: Walter Mondale. cnn.com/2021/04/19/pol…
3. He’s mostly remembered for championing numerous progressive ideas in the Senate and the Jimmy Carter administration, expanding the vice presidency’s powers, and picking the first female running mate ever, Geraldine Ferraro, during his own (unsuccessful) 1984 White House bid.
Read 9 tweets
Jeffrey Ngo 敖卓軒 Profile picture
Feb 1, 2021
1. Cross-strait tensions are on the rise again lately — given the increasing Chinese and U.S. naval presence in the region — so as usual, the discussion around #Taiwan is framed in military terms. “Will there be war?” seems to be the most common question everyone asks.
2. It’s a real concern, but this tendency to see the island as no more than a geopolitical bargaining chip rather than a vibrant democracy of 23.5 million people is dangerous and insulting. That’s also why I often find it dreadful to engage with strategically-minded “realists.”
3. The entire I.R. discipline is founded on the assumption that, if you look at a map of the world, all you see are nation-states with competing “interests,” not the lived experience of actual human beings. So you make casual suggestions like, “Let’s abandon X in exchange for Y!”
Read 8 tweets
Jeffrey Ngo 敖卓軒 Profile picture
Dec 5, 2020
1. Over the years, I’ve gotten to know personally and work with many opposition figures in #HongKong. I can say that one of the bravest, most genuine among them is @tedhuichifung. That he’s now in exile reflects the impossibility for even moderates to survive in the city.
2. His dramatic escape to Copenhagen this week was everything but assured. Thanks to helpful Danish friends — including @ThomasRohden, @Storgaaard, and @uffeelbaek — who invited him to discuss climate change and secured the necessary official documents, the court let him loose.
3. Back in 1999, Ted attended the annual Tiananmen candlelight vigil in Victoria Park and met members of the Democratic Party, which he decided to join. He rose through the ranks upon graduating from law school, winning a seat in 2011 to the Central and Western District Council.
Read 17 tweets
Jeffrey Ngo 敖卓軒 Profile picture
Sep 18, 2020
1. I’ve been reflecting a lot since the publication of @wilfredchan’s interview with me. His efforts deserve my utmost appreciation as he presents my positions faithfully and gives me an opportunity to reach new readers. Speaking with him never ceases to be stimulating.
2. On that early January morning of 2016 we met, we watched a new film, Ten Years, together in Taikoo Shing. He gave me a tour of his then-C.N.N. office in Quarry Bay. Not even half of that time — Five Years — has elapsed. Alas, Hong Kong already is beyond our recognition.
3. We agree more today than ever before. By U.S. standards, we stand on opposite sides of the debate over whether Washington’s actions regarding Hong Kong are good or bad. Yet by Hong Kong standards, and certainly among right-wing localists, we’re in essence just “leftards.”
Read 25 tweets
Jeffrey Ngo 敖卓軒 Profile picture
Jul 4, 2020
1. This new documentary of @hoccgoomusic — opened in American virtual cinemas on July 1 — charts her entertainment career and political activism, contextualizing her present journey as a world-renowned independent artist boycotted by Beijing and virtually all big-name sponsors.
2. It begins with her formative years in Montréal, return to Hong Kong for a singing competition just before the 1997 handover, early days in the Cantopop industry as a mentee of the legendary Anita Mui, and subsequent local breakthrough.
3. Then it covers her foray into the Chinese market, decision to come out at a historic L.G.B.T. march eight years ago, as well as her participation in the Umbrella Movement and the ongoing anti-government protests.
Read 7 tweets

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