Meanwhile, apart from the District Council election, the other wild-card development in the HK protest saga is Trump signing the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act (HKHRDA), which means HK could lose its special trading status with the US if Congress decides HK and/or China is coming down too hard on protesters, free speech and liberty in general.

Protesters are thrilled. Beijing is the opposite of that.

Is it a game changer? I’m skeptical. Here’s why:

1. For a start, it’s technically redundant. As this lengthy but worthwhile post from Julian Ku at Lawfare explains, most of the provisions in the HKHRDA already exist in some form or other, such as visa protections for Hong Kong residents, targeted sanctions and the ability of Congress to revoke HK’s “special status” in terms of trade and investment.

The key difference is that the HKHRDA expands the criteria for “special status” re-evaluation and requires Congress to review it once a year. According to Ku, it’s worthwhile for that and the symbolism inherent in telling China that while Congress rarely agrees on anything, it’s so united on this issue that even Trump couldn’t afford to blow it off. Which brings us to:

2. To be honest, I’m surprised Trump signed it, because he clearly didn't want to. I’m pretty sure he would have preferred to use the threat of signing it as a negotiating tool in his trade war with China. I suspect the only reason he did sign is because Congress has the votes to override a veto and Trump didn’t want to give Nervous Nancy, Little Marco and Lyin’ Ted the satisfaction of beating him at something.

I’m 100% positive he didn’t do it because he cares about the people of HK. The clue is in his signing statement – notice who he mentions first, and “out of respect”. That should give you an idea of where his priorities lie.

3. The same goes for the GOP Congresspeople who were fronting the bill – especially McConnell, Rubio, Cruz et al. They’re mainly in it for the anti-China grandstanding. China has been and remains a favorite and easy target for Republicans who still fancy themselves as anti-Commie heroes and like to be seen bashing totalitarian dictatorships. (See also: the GOP’s war on Huawei.)

4. Consequently, any subsequent enforcement of the bill is inherently going to be a political decision.

This matters because Hongkongers see the bill first and foremost as an issue of justice and human rights specific to HK’s situation. For Congress (and again, for Republicans especially), it’s partly that, but it’s mainly a tool for achieving American foreign policy objectives regarding China and elsewhere.

Put simply, as this analysis from Lausan Collective argues, the law exists mainly to further America’s economic and geopolitical interests, which historically have typically been prioritized above human rights. That means enforcement is likely to be selective, circumstantial and ultimately self-serving. The HKHRDA might be good for HK at face value – but it comes at a cost that, on a macro level, could make things worse.

5. Which is why I cringe when local people declare Trump, Rubio, Cruz and McConnell heroes and saviors for standing with HK People™.

Granted, this is because I happen to believe Trump is a racist, sexist, corrupt, mentally unhinged dictator-wannabe, and the GOP is a mass of spineless sycophants enabling and encouraging him.

All that aside, I don’t believe Rubio, Cruz and McConnell really care about HK people except as some abstract representation of the general fight for freedom from Beijing oppression that they can use in a speech. Trump cares more about winning his trade war with China, and generally sees HK as an inconvenient but possibly useful negotiating tool.

In fact, I’m not convinced he even understands what’s going on in HK. This is after all the same guy who reckoned Xi could sort the whole thing out in one “personal meeting” with the protesters (who infamously have no leaders to speak of), and also recently said the only reason Xi hasn’t sent in the tanks yet is because he, Donald J Trump, personally told him not to, yr welcome.

6. So all up, I think the protesters celebrating the HKHRDA should be prepared for disappointment – at least if they’re depending solely on the US to be their champion to the point of producing results.

7. That said, some HK protest groups seem to understand this – which is why they’re now hoping to get other countries like Canada, Germany, Australia and the UK to pass similar measures on the reasonable grounds that neither Carrie Lam nor Beijing is likely to give in to pressure from the US alone, but if enough countries join in, they will be forced to rethink their approach.

(If nothing else, getting the UK to pass its own HKHRDA will put pressure on Lam and other govt leaders who have British passports that they might be banking on as escape hatches in case China finally brings the hammer down on HK.)

This makes sense as far as it goes, because I really don’t believe the HKHRDA on its own will move the needle much in terms of how Lam handles the protests from this point on. Piling on the pressure from other countries might – and if nothing else, other such laws might actually have some teeth to them.

In any case, it’s going to take time for Lam and/or Beijing to feel the heat. Until then, the beatings will continue until morale improves.

Just another bill,

This is dF

[Sorry this is tl;dr, but there's a lot to process here. – Mgmt]

A lot has happened since last month’s post about 1 million people taking to the streets to protest a proposed bill that would enable extradition between, Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan and mainland China.

Wikipedia is keeping track of it all here if you need a quick catch-up, but suffice to say that since the last post, there have been lots more protests (peak attendance: 2 million) – some sensible, some otherwise – that have settled into a fairly predictable pattern of peaceful protests in the daytime, after which the hardcore guys get on with the violence. To be clear, for the most part, the anti-govt protesters mostly favour violence against property and cops (and only if the latter get in their way), while the pro-govt protesters favour violence against anti-govt protesters – to include apparently hiring triad gangs to beat the hell out of them with bamboo sticks.

This is expected to go on all summer long. It’s ugly and depressing and I don’t really know where all this is going.

There’s way too much here for me to comment on in one post, so just a couple of thoughts:

1. I’m very much against violence in any form, and I’m critical of the hardcore protesters who at this stage don’t seem to have any real game plan apart from generally smashing shit and beating up any cops that get in their way. To be clear, the vast majority of protesters are peaceful, but a few hundred of these guys are in this for the violence, if only because they’re so angry with the govt that they gotta beat up someone, and the police are a conveniently available face of the govt for them to smash against.

2. At the same time, I do think the police bear a lot of responsibility here. It’s no coincidence that the protests generally go peacefully until the riot police show up, which has a tendency to make things worse. Law and order and clearing the streets are all fine and well, but it’s also clear that the tear gas, rubber bullets and generally clubbing people on the head aren’t really working as a deterrent – not least because police brutality is one of the grievances the protesters are angry about.

3. That said, ultimately I think the HKG – especially chief executive Carrie Lam – bears most of the responsibility for all this.

Lam has handled this so badly it’s hard to know where to begin. The short version is that she treated the extradition bill as a simple plugging of a legal loophole, then seemed genuinely baffled why anyone would find this objectionable or worrying, as if we don’t know the kind of judicial system China has or how it works. Her initial response to critics was to ignore them, then as the protests grew bigger she tried to reassure everyone with “trust me, we’ll only actual criminals will be extradited and HK will have any final say against Beijing in cases where we think it’s a political case” – which is hard to believe when Beijing frequently reminds us at times like these that actually they do have ultimately authority over the HKG’s decisions on legal issues and if you don’t like it, then tough.

4. Lam’s greatest failure in all this is failing to understand why people were upset over the extradition bill, as well as the broader context in which all this is happening. Put simply, the people protesting in the streets aren’t just upset about the extradition law – they’re upset because they see no future in HK. Everything costs too much (especially housing), jobs don’t pay enough, the wealth gap is increasing, and their future involves HK eventually becoming part of a ruthless totalitarian regime. We can’t even hold the chief executive accountable with elections because the office is effectively appointed by Beijing. The protesters are worried about the future, and the HKG is giving them no reason to hope for anything better. At least half a dozen young people have committed suicide over this issue. And no one is listening.

5. And they’re not likely to start listening now. Yesterday Beijing’s local office held a rare press conference that aimed to not only fully support Lam and the HK police and reaffirm their authority, but also framing the current problem is entirely the fault of lawless protesters disrespecting that authority, which is in their view the only problem that needs solving. It was carefully worded, but the message was clear – unauthorized protests and violence are illegal and the govt has the right to jail you for it, the end.

And, you know, technically they're right. The anti-govt protesters have justified their escalation by pointing out the peaceful protests didn't work, but violent protests don’t work either – all they do is give the govt the excuse it needs to ignore yr grievances put you in jail. Yes that sucks, but that’s how real life works. At the same time, ignoring grievances also isn’t working, which is why we’ve arrived at this impasse.

6. Even so, despite public support for Lam, I’m sure that privately Beijing is very annoyed with her, because what started as concerns over an extradition law that no one really wanted (not even Taiwan) has blossomed into constant massive protests, street violence and calls for full-on democracy. Indeed, the extradition bill is practically dead in the water in terms of legislative action, but this isn’t really about that anymore (see Point 4, above).

Beijing has seen this before – in the summer of 1989 – and we all know how that ended.

7. Which raises the question: will HK become the new Tiananmen Square Massacree?

I really don’t know.

Beijing only has so much patience for this sort of thing. State media on the mainland (which is portraying the protests as anti-China treason) is already calling for a hard crackdown, and the head of the PLA has already said, “Call us if you need us, we’re happy to help.”

One thing in our favour is that even Xi Jinping knows that the optics of a full-on crackdown in HK will be worse than a crackdown in its own cities. And that matters more today than it did in 1989, because China is in the middle of building itself up as an engine for international economic supremacy. So it has more to lose now than it did then.

Also, unlike with Tiananmen Square, a HK Massacree is likely to be thoroughly documented on video that will undoubtedly go viral, which makes plausible deniability harder (though perhaps not impossible in these days where we’re encouraged to consume media that tells us what we want to hear).

But I’m not too optimistic. The outcome will probably depend on who blinks first. Neither side looks ready to back down. On the other hand, this has been going on for eight weeks now, and the spectacle of street violence on TV every other night is exhausting and demoralizing. Even people who support the demands of the protesters are starting to wonder how long this is going to go on. The hardcore guys no longer seem to have a game plan apart from protest, disrupt things, smash shit, wait for the cops to show up and fight them, and maybe THIS time the HKG will give us what we want.

This can’t go on indefinitely – and further escalation probably means people might start getting killed. If that happens, all bets are off.

I hope it doesn't come to that. I can’t say for sure that it won’t. What I am sure of is that there’s no version of this where we all go back to business as usual. The city has ripped itself apart over this, and no matter what happens next, most of us will be keeping an eye on 2047 with fear and trepidation.

Keep hope alive,

This is dF