Front Work Department utilized Chinese diaspora community associations under its control to purchase personal protective equipment as the COVID–19 outbreak troubled China from mid-January 2020 on. (9) In February 2020, The Global Times, a site run by the Chinese Communist Party’s People’s Daily newspaper, alleged that COVID–19 was brought to China from a United States military base during the World Games. (10) As Sheridan Prasso of Bloomberg has reported, the United Front Work Department has actively worked to undermine democracy in Hong Kong under the umbrella of China’s State Council’s Liaison Office by spreading disinformation and activating a network of media outlets, and diaspora organizations and pressuring businesses in the city to support China’s national security laws. (11) The United Front Work Department has played an integral role in China’s war on religion by leading efforts to publish a new edition of the Bible with Chinese Communist characteristics, actively running internment camps and carrying out anti-religion campaigns against Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang and severe religious repression of Buddhists in Tibet. 3. Imposition of sanctions with respect to foreign persons that knowingly spread malign disinformation as part of or on behalf of a foreign government or political party for purposes of political warfare (a) Imposition of sanctions The President shall impose the sanctions described in subsection (b) with respect to any foreign person that the President determines knowingly commits a significant act of malign dis­in­for­ma­­tion on behalf of the government of a foreign country or foreign political party which has the direct purpose or effect of influencing political, diplomatic, or educational activities in the United States for the purpose of harming— (1) the national security or defense of the United States