GOP Lawmakers Demand Treasury Department Investigate ‘CCP-Affiliated’ Firm Building Battery Plants Across US

Republican lawmakers sent a letter to the Treasury Department Wednesday urging it to investigate the “CCP-affiliated” Chinese parent company behind Gotion Inc., which intends to build electric battery plants in Illinois and Michigan.

Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, Illinois Rep. Mike Bost and Michigan representatives John Moolenaar, Bill Huizenga and Lisa McClain sent a letter to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen calling for the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) to perform a “rigorous review” of Gotion High-Tech’s ownership of Gotion Inc., citing Gotion High-Tech’s “owners’ membership and affiliation” with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Gotion Inc. is currently in the early stages of constructing several electric vehicle (EV) battery factories in Michigan and Illinois.

The letter states that Gotion High-Tech “hosted several company retreats where employees were mandated to recite a pledge of loyalty to the Party, including to ‘fight for communism,’” which was first reported by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

“Because of Guoxuan High-Tech’s owners’ membership and affiliation with the CCP, Guoxuan High-Tech’s ownership of Gotion requires a rigorous review by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS),” the letter states, using the English name that Gotion High-Tech went by prior to a May 2020 name change. “The company’s recent investments effectively hand substantive decision-making regarding the management, operation, manufacture and supply of a product the Biden Administration classifies as critical infrastructure to the People’s Republic of China (PRC).”

CFIUS is an interagency committee that is “authorized to review certain transactions involving foreign investment in the United States and certain real estate transactions by foreign persons, in order to determine the effect of such transactions on the national security of the United States,” according to the Treasury Department’s website.

Gotion Inc. received the greenlight from Michigan Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and the Biden administration to “invest $2.4 billion to construct two 550,000-square-foot production plants” for electric vehicle (EV) batteries in Big Rapids, Michigan.

More recently, Gotion Inc. announced plans to build a $2 billion EV battery plant in Manteno, Illinois, “bolstered” by state incentives, an Illinois government press release announced. Gotion Inc. could received up to $7.5 billion in federal tax credits under President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act if its Illinois factory meets its production goals, according to Good Jobs First, a business watchdog.

The lawmakers letter also states that Gotion High-Tech’s CEO Li Zhen “is a member of the Anhui Provincial Federation of Industry and Commerce, which is part of the CCP’s United Front system and takes direction from the CCP.”

The United Front’s primary missions include influence operations and intelligence collection, the U.S.-China Economic Security and Review Commission has stated.

The DCNF recently reported that Gotion High-Tech employs 923 CCP members, including Li Zhen, who is also the party secretary for the firm’s CCP committee. Under Li Zhen’s leadership, Gotion High-Tech has run multiple company field trips, during which employees dressed as Red Army soldiers, the DCNF found.

The DCNF also reported that Gotion High-Tech launched a joint venture company with a “Communist Chinese Military Company (CCMC) Subsidiary” in 2016.

“In the interest of U.S. national security, we respectfully request you conduct an immediate CFIUS review, and if necessary, order the divestment of Gotion, Inc by Guoxuan High-Tech and its CCP owners,” the letter sent to the Treasury Department states.

The Treasury Department, Gotion High-Tech and Gotion Inc. did not respond immediately to the DCNF’s request for comment.