Washington — Democratic Sen. Elissa Slotkin is urging President Trump to press Chinese President Xi Jinping on evidence that the Iranians used satellite images from Chinese entities to carry out the July attack on a military base in Jordan that killed three U.S. service members and wounded four others.
In a letter sent to the president Friday and obtained by CBS News, the Michigan senator urged the president to make that issue “a centerpiece of your talks with President Xi” during his White House visit next week.
Mr. Trump has spoken deferentially of Xi during the war with Iran, in spite of questions that have arisen about possible Chinese assistance to Tehran. Last week, the Wall Street Journal, citing U.S. officials, reported that Tehran had acquired images of the base from the Chinese.
“For months, we have known that Chinese companies are helping the Iranian military target and attempt to kill U.S. troops,” Slotkin wrote. Citing the Journal’s report, she said, “But new reporting now shows that this support from China may have directly contributed to the deaths of American servicemembers.”
In May, the Trump administration sanctioned three Chinese satellite companies for providing imagery that “enables Iran’s military strikes against U.S. forces in the Middle East”: Meentropy Technology, The Earth Eye and Chang Guang Satellite Technology.
Slotkin noted that the report said that Iran had “acquired high-resolution satellite images of a U.S. base in Jordan from Chinese companies both before and after an Iranian attack in July that killed three American servicemembers and wounded four others.”
She continued, “But when you were asked this week whether you would raise this issue—three American servicemembers potentially killed as a result of Chinese companies supplying targeting information to Iran—with President Xi during his visit, you said, ‘I think he’s behaved reasonably well.'”
In July, Iranian missiles and drones struck housing at the Muwaffaq Salti Air Base in northeast Jordan. The attacks killed 19-year-old Pvt. Isabella Gonzales, 25-year-old 1st Lt. Tyler James Feehan and Sgt. Angel S. Rampersad, 28.
While speaking with reporters aboard Air Force One last Sunday, Mr. Trump said of Xi, “I think he’s behaved reasonably well, and we behave reasonably well. You know, when they say that China spies on us, I say ‘you’re right, and we spy on them too.’ You know, we spy on them, too.” He said, “They basically do what we do.”
Mr. Trump will welcome Xi to the White House on Sept. 24 for a summit and lavish state dinner. This will be the second time this year that the two leaders will meet face to face after their meeting in Beijing in May. Xi last visited the White House in 2015.
Slotkin criticized Mr. Trump, saying that his “insistence on rolling out the red carpet for our adversaries and kicking our allies in the teeth is beyond me.”
“But I would hope, as commander-in-chief of the armed forces, the provision of targeting information by China to help Iran kill American servicemembers would be something even you can’t tolerate,” she wrote.
Slotkin, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee and the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, urged the president to make it clear to Xi that “this support must stop immediately — and that there will be consequences China will face if it fails to act.”
A senior administration official said in response to Slotkin’s letter, “Iran has been decimated. As the President stated, nothing that any outside actor is doing to help Iran is in any way increasing their ability to target Americans.”
