For well over a decade we've discussed the short-sightedness of the US repeatedly demanding that China "respect" US intellectual property, because China has only turned that around on the US, and used Chinese patents as a way to block American competitors from entering the Chinese market. Things seemed to go up a notch recently, after the US government expanded its attempts to block Huawei from the US market, and Huawei suddenly remembered it owned a shit ton of patents and started demanding Verizon pay on the order of a billion dollars or face patent infringement claims.

As we discussed, Huawei was just following the established playbook of using the US's bizarrely stupid obsession with "patents" against the US itself. Hilariously, Huawei's CEO was just recently quoted as insisting that the company would not "weaponize" its patents, at the same time that it was clear that that's exactly what Huawei is doing. Of course, as we've learned over the years, patents are designed to be weaponized and are frequently used as weapons against innovation.

In response to all of this, rather than recognizing that our over emphasis on patents (and our demands that China "respect" those patents) might be a big part of the problem, Senator Marco Rubio, has submitted an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) that would literally block Huawei from enforcing its patents in US courts. In a tweet, Rubio defended this blatantly protectionist move:

#Huawei is using the tactics of patent trolls to attack U.S. companies in retaliation for Trump administration national security actions against them. We should not allow #China government backed companies to improperly use our legal system against us.https://t.co/jhz4cuLDVN

— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) June 18, 2019

I tend to agree that patents are frequently used to stifle competition and innovation and to retaliate against others, but it does seem bizarre and (once again) stupidly short-sighted to single out Huawei and other Chinese companies (what the amendment effectively does), and say they cannot enforce their US patents in US courts. The law specifically says that companies from countries on the (laughably arbitrary) USTR "priority watch list" cannot "bring or maintain an action for infringement of a patent," nor "file a complaint" with the ITC or "otherwise obtain any relief under the laws of the US."

So it doesn't take a genius chess player to figure out what is likely to happen next. After literally decades of US politicians and diplomats screaming about how China needs to "respect our patents," and when it finally starts using our own patent system against us, sees the US government seek to flat out exclude China from making use of the US patent system... how long will it take for China to do effectively the same thing in China to again block US companies from operating and competing there.

How can the US possibly go around telling other countries to "respect our patents," when the second a country like China starts using our patent system, Congress pushes a law that flat out excludes them from doing so. Rubio's amendment is just decorating the facade that is the claim that patents are a system for protecting innovation. They are not. They are a protectionist, monopolistic trade practice designed to benefit some at the expense of others. Now that a disfavored company - Huawei - is making use of them, suddenly Congress wants to pull that ability out from under them. This is not about "respecting" patents. It's about who gets the power to decide who can innovate. And apparently China is not allowed.