A handful of state attorneys general have criticized President Donald Trump’s Department of Justice for approving a merger between two telecommunications companies, HPE and Juniper. As a former Virginia attorney general and senior Homeland Security Department official in the federal government who has firsthand experience on how this merger will directly help protect the commonwealth’s national security interests, I challenge these attorneys general’s assessments.
The truth is that Huawei, a company controlled by the Chinese government, dominates the global telecommunications industry and is one of the biggest threats to our security interests as it is giving China the upper hand in 5G, AI and much else in numerous parts of the world. And this threat, unfortunately, has a direct home right in Virginia, as Huawei planted its U.S. research arm, Futurewei, in Reston.
Congress, with Virginia’s voice at the forefront, recognized the risk and helped small telecoms replace that equipment. In doing so, it protected not only our local communities but also critical military and intelligence installations across the commonwealth that depend on secure networks.
The threat Huawei posed to our homeland was so bad that the U.S. ultimately banned its products for use here, while Virginia Sen. Mark Warner, a former telecommunications executive who once chaired the Senate Intelligence Committee, sponsored a bill to stop federal funding to Huawei. This was a huge leap forward to protecting U.S. networks as well as residents of the commonwealth from cyberespionage.
Despite the existing ban, Huawei hasn’t yet left the commonwealth, with Futurewei still retaining its office space in Virginia. That’s concerning for us all, especially considering the many credible intellectual property theft charges and allegations that have been leveled at Huawei.
The HPE-Juniper merger is a tremendous strategic benefit to the United States in dealing with the Huawei threat. The merger creates a company big and strong enough to compete with Huawei on the global stage so that the Huawei threat can be effectively contended with all over the world. Even the U.S. intelligence community personally lobbied the DOJ to approve the merger — because it’s just strategic common sense.
As a lawyer and former Virginia attorney general who reviewed, approved and stopped countless mergers over the course of my career, I can say with confidence that no court in its right mind would have allowed the Justice Department to block this merger. Even after the deal is finalized, HPE-Juniper will not be the biggest American telecom company, let alone the biggest one globally. DOJ was right to move it forward to increase competition in the market and to help us address the strategic threat posed by Huawei.
No state has more at stake in this fight than Virginia. We are home to the Pentagon, the CIA and the world’s largest concentration of data centers, in Loudoun County. Every day, those facilities guard America’s secrets and carry the internet traffic that powers the global economy. Allowing hostile technology providers such as Huawei anywhere near that infrastructure is unthinkable, and staying out of the way of companies growing to challenge Huawei just makes sense.
Virginians are proud of our innovation economy. From cybersecurity startups in Virginia Beach to cloud-computing hubs in Ashburn, our state thrives when American technology is strong and competitive. The HPE-Juniper merger aligns with that vision, allowing the growth of resilient U.S. firms that can out-innovate, out-secure and out-compete foreign adversaries.
We should welcome DOJ’s decision as a concrete step in defending our state, our economy and our country from one of the most serious technology threats we face today.
Ken Cuccinelli of Spotsylvania was the 46th Attorney General of Virginia from 2010 to 2014 and served as the senior official performing the duties of U.S. deputy secretary of Homeland Security from 2019 to 2021.
