(NewsNation) — The Biden administration issued an order this week to block a Chinese cryptocurrency mining company from owning land near a nuclear missile base in Wyoming, citing national security risks.
The firm, MineOne Partners, backed by Chinese nationals, operates within a mile of F.E. Warren Air Force Base in Cheyenne. The administration called the proximity a “national security risk.”
The Treasury Department said “specialized and foreign-sourced equipment potentially capable of facilitating surveillance and espionage activities” partly inspired the order, but did not provide specifics on the risks.
MineOne bought the land in 2022 but failed to report the purchase under proper protocols. A public tip ultimately alerted authorities to the potentially questionable motives for selecting the location.
U.S. officials are sounding the alarm over an increase in foreigners caught recording American military bases.
Chinese nationals tried to enter U.S. military sites more than 100 times last year, often posing as tourists or food delivery drivers for DoorDash, according to the Daily Mail.
Retired Air Force Brig. Gen. John Teichert told NewsNation this surveillance tactic from the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is not new and “certainly isn’t the only way they are actively surveilling the U.S.”
“Just watching pattern of life and gathering open source intelligence provides them a lot of opportunity to understand our security practices,” Teichert said. “When you piece a lot of these data points together, then you come up with an overall idea of our capabilities or readiness and our vulnerabilities.”
In a statement to NewsNation, DoorDash said: “These reports are deeply concerning, and we take any allegations that our platform is being misused extremely seriously.”
The order gives MineOne 90 days to remove structures and equipment and 120 days to sell the property. However, Teichert warned it may be too late if bad actors have already gathered information.
“It is Chinese communist clubs on college campuses or Chinese police stations in US cities or 700 billion dollars of stolen intellectual property a year by the Chinese communist party,” he said. “Sadly, they have been implementing that strategy for the last two and a half decades, and to some extent, we’re not as vigilant and diligent as we should be to stop them.”
Meanwhile, the U.S. Justice Department and TikTok asked a federal appeals court to expedite a ruling on the new law requiring China-based ByteDance to divest TikTok’s U.S. assets by Jan. 19 or face a ban.