Georgia Democratic Senate candidate Jon Ossoff continues to take advantage of Fox News to create instantly viral moments on the campaign trail.
With just days left before his Jan. 5 runoff election against Sen. David Perdue (R-GA), Ossoff was once again approached by Fox News reporter Peter Doocy on Thursday during a live Fox broadcast.
While Ossoff used Wednesday’s impromptu interview to appeal to Fox News viewers and take swipes at both Perdue and Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R-GA), who is running in a separate Georgia runoff race, this time around the 33-year-old Senate hopeful pushed back on the conservative narrative that he’s beholden to the Chinese Communist Party.
Noting that Ossoff amended his financial disclosure in July to list additional payments his investigative film company received—which included a $1,000 payment from a Hong Kong TV channel—Doocy pressed Ossoff on why the transaction wasn’t listed in the initial disclosure.
“Why is it that you waited until after the primary to reveal that your business did business with the company in Hong Kong that was linked to the Chinese government?” Doocy asked, echoing Perdue’s accusation that Ossoff was “paid by the Communist Chinese government through a media company.”
Ossoff, meanwhile, noted that “the entire substance of Sen. Perdue’s campaign” against him is that a television channel in Hong Kong licensed a documentary about ISIS war criminals from his company. He then went on to highlight Perdue’s own business history, which featured the wealthy executive outsourcing jobs to China and helping to build factories in China.
Doocy circled back to the amended financial disclosure, asking Ossoff why he waited until after the primary to update his forms. The young Democratic candidate, however, waved the question off as something Perdue is trying to “make a big deal about.”
The Fox reporter then took another route with his question, invoking the recent revelation that Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA) was informed by the FBI in 2015 that an alleged Chinese spy had gained access to him. The congressman cut ties with the woman after the FBI briefing and has not been accused of wrongdoing.
“Recently we saw the Chinese government tried to make inroads with a young Democratic lawmaker Eric Swalwell. Are you concerned that through a payment to a well-known young Democrat, somebody linked to China or the Chinese through another company could be trying to influence you?”
“C’mon, man! You’re a serious reporter,” Ossoff shot back. “Do you really believe that a TV channel in Hong Kong airing an investigation that my company produced of ISIS war crimes in Iraq is what you’re implying it is or what David Perdue is implying it is?”
After Doocy wondered aloud if Ossoff didn’t believe the Chinese government was trying to influence young politicians, the Democratic candidate turned the question back around to Perdue.
“Chinese intelligence operations in the United States are a grave threat to our national security,” he declared. “And that’s why it’s so concerning that we have a senator like David Perdue.”
“Senator David Perdue bragged under oath about how he spent most of his career outsourcing American jobs to China,” he concluded. “He operated factories in Shenzhen province in China in cooperation with the Chinese Communist Party and he should explain that on the record.”