Ford’s Partner in Billion-Dollar Michigan EV Factory Is a Chinese Military Company, Pentagon Says

The Department of Defense added Chinese electric vehicle battery maker CATL—which Ford Motor Company has partnered with on a billion-dollar EV project in Michigan—to a list of companies that actively aid China's military.

The Pentagon published documents Tuesday designating CATL and 133 other companies to its Section 1260H list of Chinese military companies, which the Department of Defense is required to update on an annual basis.

Lawmakers, security experts, and former federal officials have warned for years that the China-based CATL maintains strong ties to the Chinese Communist Party infrastructure even as the firm continues to develop a high-profile EV project with Ford in Michigan.

CATL's inclusion on the list is another black eye for both Ford's struggling EV business and Democrats' climate ambitions—the Ford-CATL project was made possible by Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D., Mich.), whose administration helped fund it with nearly $2 billion in direct subsidies and tax breaks. It is the latest evidence of the Chinese government's stranglehold on global green energy supply chains.

"There is no such thing as a private company in China, and I am encouraged to see that the Pentagon has updated its 1260H list to include Chinese military companies active on U.S. soil," Rep. John Moolenaar (R., Mich.), who chairs the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, told the Washington Free Beacon.

"The Select Committee has highlighted these companies because they work with or are affiliated with the Chinese military and are active threats to American security," he continued. "We cannot allow these loaded guns to threaten our economy and security, and the Select Committee will continue to be a watchdog for the American people in the new Congress."

Neither Ford nor Whitmer's office responded to requests for comment.

The action Tuesday comes nearly two years after Ford announced its partnership with CATL alongside Whitmer. Ford pledged in February 2023 to invest $3.5 billion in the Marshall, Mich., factory, saying the plant would create 2,500 jobs and have a battery manufacturing capacity of 35 gigawatt-hours. Ford downsized the project months later amid declining consumer demand for EVs.

While CATL is not a state-owned business, Chinese investors tied to the Chinese Communist Party hold financial stakes in the company, the New York Times reported in 2021. The Chinese government has also taken strategic steps over the last decade to bolster CATL and other major EV companies based in China.

In addition, Zeng Yuqun, who founded CATL in 2012 and remains its top executive, was identified in 2023 as a member of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) National Committee. According to a U.S. report published in 2018, the committee is a "critical coordinating body" that brings together representatives of Chinese interest groups and is led by the CCP’s Politburo Standing Committee.

The CPPCC National Committee once highlighted Yuqun's work with CATL fortifying China's lithium supply chains, which are crucial for electric vehicle production and other green energy development.

"I applaud the Department of the Defense for taking the necessary step to provide for our common defense by formally declaring PRC-based and CCP-tied CATL a Chinese Military Company, as it presents a national security threat to the United States of America," former United States ambassador Joseph Cella, a cofounder of the Michigan-China Economic and Security Review Group, told the Free Beacon.

"Unconscionably, Governor Whitmer refused to perform the most basic of strict scrutiny and due diligence as directed by our national security and intelligence agencies before spending billions of Michigan taxpayer dollars on this corrupted 'deal,'" Cella added.

"This should also be a wake-up call to any governor across the country who might be neck deep in seemingly benign business 'deals' with PRC-based and CCP-tied companies that are, in fact, engaged in deliberate subnational incursions, political warfare, and espionage."

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