Former House Foreign Affairs Committee chair Ed Royce, a Republican from California, has registered as a lobbyist for Chinese tech giant Tencent, which helps implement the Chinese Communist Party’s censorship and surveillance regime.
The catch: While in office, Royce was an outspoken critic of the Vietnamese Communist Party’s human rights abuses and backed several bills targeting China.
The big picture: Royce is only the latest in a line of former elected officials to lobby on behalf of Chinese companies accused of being complicit in human rights abuses.