For too long, China has gotten a free pass. With the approaching U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue, the president has an opportunity to prioritize these issues — to charge every participating U.S. government agency to bring human rights to the forefront with their Chinese counterparts, to present them with lists of political prisoners and to press, by name, for their unconditional release. The administration can take proactive steps today to impose visa bans on Chinese government officials who are perpetrators of grave human-rights abuses. Twenty-six years ago, several Tiananmen art students constructed a magnificent papier-mâché statue of the so-called goddess of democracy, in the hopes of bolstering the fledgling protest movement. It was ultimately destroyed by soldiers clearing the square, but not before its creators authored a declaration explaining their work. It read, in part: On the day when real democracy and freedom come to China, we must erect another Goddess of Democracy here in the Square, monumental, towering, and permanent. We have strong faith that that day will come at last. Helping the Chinese people reach that day is not just our moral duty as a free people — it will have a profound effect on the state of freedom in the world and on global security. We must keep the faith with the Tiananmen generation and work toward the realization of their dream for generations to come. Marco Rubio is the junior U.S. senator from Florida. Walker Statement: Clinton And Obama Have “Seriously Downplayed The Chinese Government’s Human Rights Violations.” “Secretary Clinton and President Obama have seriously downplayed the Chinese government’s human rights violations. On her first trip to China as Secretary of State, Clinton said human rights ‘can’t interfere’ with other aspects of the bilateral relationship, signaling to Beijing that America would essentially turn a blind eye as the Chinese government repressed groups including ethnic minorities and China’s 100 million Christians.” [“Government Walker’s Statement on the 26th Anniversary of the Tiananmen Square Massacre, 6/4/15] Russia Jeb Bush Called For A More Aggressive Stance Against Russia’s Vladimir Putin, Noting, In A Jab At Hillary Clinton, “We’re Beginning To Realize The Reset Button Didn’t Turn Out So Hot.” “Bush’s speech at Wirtschaftsrat, the annual conference of the Economic Council of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union, was his first public event on a five-day trip to Germany, Poland and Estonia. He used it to stake out a muscular foreign policy well within mainstream Republican views. Bush called for an aggressive stance against Russian President Vladimir Putin and took aim at the Obama administration’s foreign and fiscal policies, even as he in effect embraced some of them. ‘We’re beginning to realize the reset button didn’t turn out so hot,’ Bush said, referring to the Obama administration and former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton’s proposed ‘reset’ of diplomatic relations with Moscow in 2009. Putin was then prime minister under Russian President Dmitry Medvedev.” [LA Times, 6/9/15] Jeb Bush, In A Dig At Hillary Clinton, Argued It Was “Clear” That “The Much-Heralded Reset Didn’t Work Out” With Russia, Pointing To A “Much More Aggressive” Putin. “Asked what previous administrations have gotten wrong about Putin, Bush put the onus on the Russian leader. ‘Putin has changed,’ he said. ‘He just invaded another country, that was different than it was a decade ago,’ Bush added, a reference to Russia's takeover of part of Ukraine. ‘This is a different Putin, much more aggressive. So I don't begrudge anybody trying to develop better relationships with any country. But it's clear that, in this particular case, the much-heralded reset didn't work out.’ The ‘reset’ was a dig at Democratic presidential front-runner Hillary Clinton, who as secretary of state declared one with her Russian counterpart.” [Bloomberg, 6/10/15]