阿肯色州参议员汤姆·科顿(Tom Cotton)几个月来一直指责中国在他们的冠状病毒爆发数据上“撒谎”，他周日表示，美国大学“培养了共产党最聪明的人才”，这是一个“丑闻”
周日接受福克斯新闻采访时，科顿指责中国学生到美国大学接受教育，称他们最终会回到中国，“竞争我们的工作”，窃取美国的创新理念。他说，中国学生不应该被允许在美国大学学习科学作为惩罚，中国的冠状病毒数量可能比他们的估计多“40倍”。
“我认为我们需要非常认真地审视我们给予中国公民的学习签证，特别是在高级科技领域的研究生水平，”科顿说。
“如果中国学生想来这里学习莎士比亚和《联邦党人报》，那是他们需要向美国学习的。他们不需要学习量子计算，”这位阿肯色州参议员告诉福克斯新闻。“[中国公民]回到中国竞争我们的工作，抢走我们的生意，最终窃取我们的财产，设计武器和其他可以用来对付美国人民的设备。”
棉花提醒观众中国人被指控从包括美国在内的外国竞争对手那里窃取知识产权，而他们的主要目标——正如他所说的那样，就是所谓的冠状病毒的故意传播——旨在占据经济优势。
参议员的阿肯色州办公室没有立即回应新闻周刊周日下午征求意见。
在周五接受福克斯新闻主持人玛莎·麦卡勒姆(Martha MacCallum)采访时，她引用了香港大学的一项研究，该研究发现，去年晚些时候在中国蔓延的最初的COVID-19疫情可能感染了23万人，是中国政府估计的5.5万人的四倍。研究人员指出，部分“漏报”与中国政府在COVID-19病例传播的前几周对其进行的分类有关。
科顿一直指责中国政府在第一波冠状病毒爆发数字上“仍在撒谎”，甚至在特朗普政府2月镇压之前的1月下旬呼吁对从中国飞往美国的航班实施“有针对性的旅行禁令”。参议员讲述福克斯商业网2月中旬称，“中国的口是心非和不诚实”使人对中国政府披露的与武汉动物市场有关的任何事情产生怀疑。科顿暗示，武汉的生物安全实验室可能是传播冠状病毒的罪魁祸首，但他指出，“我们没有证据表明这种疾病起源于那里。”
周日，科顿批评美国学校招收中国人学习科学，重申他们后来直接与美国同行竞争。
“中国共产党领导层不希望看到他们在世界上的相对权力和地位下降，因为这种病毒被控制在中国境内，所以他们故意对世界隐藏它，”科顿在福克斯新闻(Fox News)节目播出后于周日下午发帖称。
阿肯色州参议员汤姆·科顿(Tom Cotton)几个月来一直指责中国在他们的冠状病毒爆发数据上“撒谎”，他周日表示，美国大学“培养了共产党最聪明的人才”，这是一个“丑闻”
GOP SENATOR TOM COTTON SAYS CHINESE STUDENTS SHOULD BE BANNED FROM STUDYING SCIENCE AT U.S. COLLEGES
A rkansas Senator Tom Cotton, who has for months accused China of "lying" about their coronavirus outbreak numbers, said Sunday it's a "scandal" that American universities have "trained the Communist Party's brightest minds."
Cotton railed against Chinese students coming to colleges in the United States to receive an education during an interview Sunday on Fox News, arguing that they ultimately return to China and "compete for our jobs" and steal innovative U.S. ideas. He said Chinese students shouldn't be allowed to study sciences in American colleges and universities as punishment, and that China's coronavirus numbers are potentially "40 times" greater than their estimates.
"I think we need to take a very hard look at the visas we give to Chinese nationals to study, especially, at the post-graduate level in advanced scientific and technological fields," Cotton said.
"If Chinese students want to come here and study Shakespeare and the Federalist Papers, that's what they need to learn from America. They don't need to learn quantum computing," the Arkansas senator told Fox News. "[Chinese nationals] go back to China to compete for our jobs, to take our business and ultimately to steal our property and design weapons and other devices that can be used against the American people."
Cotton reminded viewers that the Chinese stand accused of stealing intellectual property from foreign competitors including the U.S. and that their primary goal - as he said was illustrated by their alleged intentional spread of the coronavirus - is aimed at economic dominance.
The senator's Arkansas office did not immediately respond to Newsweek's Sunday afternoon request for comment.
During a Friday interview with Fox News host Martha MacCallum, she cited a Hong Kong University study which found that the initial COVID-19 outbreak which spread across China late last year likely infected 230,000 people -- four times more than the Chinese government's estimate of 55,000. The researchers noted that part of the "under-count" has been tied to the Chinese government's classification of COVID-19 cases in the early weeks of its spread.
Cotton has consistently accused the Chinese government of "still lying" about their first-wave coronavirus outbreak numbers, even calling for a "targeted travel ban" on flights from China to the U.S. in late January prior to the Trump administration's February crackdown. The senator told Fox Business Network in mid-February that "China's duplicity and dishonesty" casts doubt on anything their government has revealed about ties to the Wuhan animal market. Cotton suggested that Wuhan's biosafety laboratory was potentially responsible for spreading coronavirus, but noted, "we don't have evidence that this disease originated there."
On Sunday, Cotton criticized American schools for taking in Chinese nationals to study sciences, reiterating they later compete directly against their American peers.
"The Chinese Communist leadership did not want to see their relative power and standing in the world decline because this virus was contained within China so they deliberately hid it from the world," Cotton tweeted Sunday afternoon following his Fox News appearance.
Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton, who has for months accused China of "lying" about their coronavirus outbreak numbers, said Sunday it's a "scandal" that American universities have "trained the Communist Party's brightest minds."
