Mehmet Oz says he'll be 'tough on China' as a senator. But a 2013 announcement from a Chinese health tech company offers a different perspective.

• Criticizing China has been a cornerstone of Oz's US Senate campaign in Pennsylvania.
• But Oz once embraced doing business with — and "bringing joy" to — China.

Throughout his US Senate campaign in Pennsylvania, Republican candidate Mehmet Oz has reserved some of his strongest criticism for China — and those who'd court the communist nation.

"Dr. Oz believes the United States has failed to respond to the global Chinese threat," states the "Get Tough on China" portion of his website.

"President Trump endorsed me because he knows I'm the America First fighter that will stand up to Communist China," Oz tweeted in May, adding later that month that he "will stand up to China and continue President Trump's America First agenda when I get to Washington."

And Oz castigated his now-vanquished Republican primary opponent, Dave McCormick, whom he defeated by fewer than 1,000 votes, as "the China first candidate in the race" — a knock on McCormick's overseas business dealings.

But a buzz-wordy press release issued nearly a decade ago by Neusoft Xikang, a healthcare technology subsidiary of Chinese software and information technology giant Neusoft Corporation, suggests Oz's hardline sentiments toward China weren't always so.

Rather, Oz — a media-personality-turned-Donald Trump-endorsed politician struggling to keep pace with Democrat John Fetterman in Pennsylvania's US Senate race — celebrated his new "partnership" in China.

"I'm very pleased to visit China and join hands with Neusoft Xikang to integrate American health management practice with Chinese medical practices and innovative healthcare technology," Oz is quoted as saying in the June 7, 2013, press release, which announced a partnership with Oz Media, Oz's business company.

Oz would serve as Neusoft's "chief healthcare advisor" and contribute "to the company's strategy and business development planning," said the release, which was distributed in English, French, German, and Spanish by PRNewswire, and remains posted today on Neusoft's corporate website. Neusoft's June 2013 corporate newsletter similarly trumpeted an Oz-Neusoft union, and one of its Facebook pages features a photo of Oz shaking hands.

Neusoft said it would "integrate Dr. Oz's advanced healthcare methods and practices" to "accelerate the development of health management in China." Neusoft Chairman and CEO Liu Jiren said the "partnership between Dr. Oz and Neusoft marks a perfect combination of leading health management methodologies and innovative technology platform" and "enhance the exchanges between developed countries and emerging countries in the field of health management."

Added Oz: "I believe this partnership will spur new dynamism for the existing healthcare ecosystem, and significantly promote the development of novel health management approaches in China … Sharing the wisdom with the Chinese public will bring joy to our new audience and our team."

Brittany Yanick, Oz's campaign spokesperson, did not dispute the veracity of Oz's quotes in Neusoft's 2013 announcement but said a partnership between the celebrity doctor and Neusoft ultimately didn't materialize and does not exist today.

"Dr. Oz never had a partnership with them, there was never a deal," she said in a one-line statement.

Oz's campaign did not respond to specific questions about what led to Neusoft's announcement in 2013 or the role Oz played in it. Neusoft did not respond to Insider's requests for comment, either.

Oz and China: business and politics

Prior to becoming a political candidate in late 2021, Oz demonstrated an openness to working in China and with Chinese entities, taking a business-like approach to his relationships with them.

For example, Oz exported his long-running television program, "The Dr. Oz Show," to China and "made business trips there," Politico reported.

Oz also "had a lucrative sponsorship deal to promote the products of Usana Health Sciences, a company whose largest single market is China, where it also makes some of its goods," Politico reporters Daniel Lippman and Holly Otterbein wrote.

In a 2010 New York Times article headlined "Sony hopes for a blockbuster as 'Dr. Oz' format goes to China," Oz described how his US-based TV show was easily exported.

"The look and feel of the show are identical," Oz told the New York Times, noting that the Chinese set was built to the same specifications and the studio audience positioned the same way. The issues cross cultures, too, Oz said: "Weight loss, that's a big problem in China today. Beauty questions; aging; the whole pain category."

More recently, in March 2020, Oz praised China's overall response to the then-emerging COVID-19 pandemic, telling NBC News: "We just have to copy what they did. Take their blueprint and repeat here in this country."

Oz is also the co-author of a 2021 book, "Yin Yang You," with Beijing University of Chinese Medicine President Anlong Xu. Oz promotes the book — $16.95 plus tax — on the Dr. Oz Show website. Some conservatives grumbled, with the Washington Free Beacon suggesting Oz's book deal brought him in too-close proximity to the Chinese Communist Party.

Oz, as quoted in the 2013 Neusoft press release, offered an optimistic outlook on his own company's relationship with China.

"I believe this partnership will spur new dynamism for the existing healthcare ecosystem, and significantly promote the development of novel health management approaches in China," Oz said.

But Oz's tone on China changed upon entering electoral politics. In an ad Oz's campaign ran earlier this year against McCormick, Oz chides his opponent for saying that "China's success and growth is very much in the interest of the United States."

McCormick, Oz's campaign said, is a "woke hedge fund CEO who chose Communist China over Pennsylvania. He'll always be China First and America last."

"China's friend, not ours," another Oz ad declared.

Oz had not directed China-centric barbs at Fetterman of late, likely because Fetterman, who touts his support of labor unions and American manufacturing, isn't exactly enamored with China, either.

"Making more stuff here in America would mean prices wouldn't spike every time there's a problem overseas," Fetterman wrote in a July 13 opinion piece in the Erie Times-News. "We don't need to be outsourcing any more jobs and production to China."

Reporter Madison Hall contributed to this report.