Select Committee on China Hearing Decries Gotion Investment in US Plants
At a field hearing in Michigan, House Select Committee on China Chairman Rep. John Moolenaar, R-Mich., and committee member Rep. Darin LaHood, R-Ill., emphasized electric vehicle battery maker Gotion's ties to suppliers that use Uyghur forced labor, and questioned why Gotion should be allowed to open factories in their states. Gotion declined to send a representative to testify, they said.
Moolenaar said that Gotion’s supply chains are linked to human rights abuses and the government's genocide of Uyghurs, which he said includes killings and slave labor.
Congress passed a law saying that the Defense Department cannot buy Chinese advanced batteries, beginning in fiscal year 2028 (see 2406070033). Referring to that law, Moolenaar said, "Why would we allow [Gotion's] batteries into its homes and cars?" He asked why federal, state and local governments should give subsidies to Gotion for opening factories to make those batteries?
They also mentioned how they have asked the Forced Labor Enforcement Task Force to put Gotion on its entity list (see 2406060039). They also are among 50 sponsors of a bill that would prohibit manufacturing subsidies going to Chinese firms that open plants in the U.S.
Witnesses also recommended that the audience submit comments about the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. restrictions on Chinese ownership of land near certain military bases (see 2407180009).
Witness Emily de La Bruyere, co-founder of Horizon Advisory, a strategic consulting firm focused on the implications of China’s competitive approach to geopolitics, told the members of Congress that China's industrial policy is aimed at creating import dependency on all other countries, and that ultimately, "Beijing then converts that dependence into … coercion." She said cutting off supply is what the Chinese government sees as its strategic trump card.
She said that it's not just EV batteries or EVs themselves that Beijing wishes to dominate, since they are the technologies of the future, and had no dominant incumbents when China began pursuing those sectors. Rather, Chinese firms have vertical integration, so an EV battery company also owns the component makers, and those components are made with minerals processed by Chinese firms and the minerals are mined by Chinese firms in whatever country they come from.
She said these links are developed through both nonmarket policies and human rights abuses.
She asked rhetorically: "If we depend on China’s genocide, how can we fight it?"
De La Bruyere said that Xinjiang is a hub of lithium processing, graphite processing, manganese, electrolytic nickel and electrolytic aluminum, as well as anode production.
She said the concentration of these processes in Xinjiang, along with primary aluminum production there was deliberate. "The goal is to effectively make sure you cannot build an electric vehicle unless you are relying on products from Xinjiang," she said.
Moolenaar asked her: "How vulnerable is the U.S. auto industry to China dependence?"
"Incredibly vulnerable," she replied. "You can’t make the foil you need for batteries without Chinese companies."