A tiny town in Michigan has emerged onto the national news stage and become the most recent arena for Chinese-American animosity. Gotion, a Chinese subsidiary based out of Silicon Valley, had planned to build and operate a new, $2.4 billion lithium battery plant in the area. Green Charter Township, which has a population of roughly 3,000 residents, erupted in opposition.
Gotion’s project calls for two 550,000-square-foot factories to be built on 270 acres of uninhabited land; they would provide jobs for 2,300 workers at an hourly rate of $29.50 an hour. They already have plants in California and Ohio and another planned in Illinois.
Gotion seeks to take advantage of the subsidies available for renewable energy production (on U.S. soil) as a result of Biden’s 2022 Inflation Reduction Act. Altogether, the project stands to benefit from $800M worth of tax-emptions and state subsidies.
While a few residents have expressed concerns regarding the ecological impact such a large factory would have on the area (the proposed plant is estimated to use 770,000 gallons of water a day), the main source of concern for the townspeople is Gotion’s ties to the Chinese Communist Party. While they can’t necessarily cite the specific danger a Chinese-owned factory might cause, they are by and large fearful of China’s growing influence abroad.
Lori Brock, who lives on a horse farm a few miles away from the zoned area, says, “It’s the Communist influences that I’m bothered by, because they have shown repeatedly that they don’t care about our rules, our laws or anything. They shouldn’t be able to buy here.” Presidential long-shot candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, who calls for banning Chinese investments, held a rally at Ms. Brock’s farm today.
Corri Riebow, another Green Charter resident, agrees. ”I’m concerned about the Chinese ties, not because of the Chinese people, but because of the Chinese government, the things I researched about them.”
According to Rhodium Group, Michigan has received about $175 billion worth of Chinese investment since 1990.
Those who share Lori’s perspective and want to see the plans for the lithium plant scuttled altogether are extremely vocal in their resistance. Jim Chapman, a retired police officer and one of the few residents advocating for the project, suggests that a portion of people are already toeing the line. Chapman says he’s heard neighbors discuss activating the state militia and opposing the planned project by exercising their 2nd Amendment right.
Despite Chapman’s aforementioned radicals, the main body of the opposition movement is organized and effective, and largely unproblematic. Their first goal is unseating the elected officials of the board of trustees that initially approved the plan, for which they require 415 signatures, but they’re also already raising money for future legal battles as they provision to fight Gotion at every step of the process. They also already have their choice of candidates to replace the board members.
Despite their position being rooted in Fox News inherited Chinese paranoia, the situation in Green Charter Township remains a hopeful example of how change is possible, especially at a local level, through civic unity and engaging with the system; a notion worth remembering at a time when anti-establishment and doomerist sentiment seems all the rage on both sides of the aisle.
If they wanted to save their time and money, Gotion’s due diligence into the potential future project should have gone no further than this:
