Rubio, Michigan Republican ask Pentagon to blacklist world’s biggest EV battery maker from contracts

Two congressional Republicans asked the Pentagon on Wednesday to add the world’s biggest manufacturers of electric vehicle (EV) batteries to a list of entities subject to restrictions because of ties to the Chinese government.

In the letter, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party Chair John Moolenaar (R-Mich.) called on the Defense Department to add Contemporary Amperex Technology (CATL) to its entity list, which would bar it from receiving Pentagon contracts.

CATL holds a market share of about 37 percent for EV batteries and made more than $55 billion in 2023. In 2022, Ford announced it would be the automaker’s vendor for batteries for two electric Mustang models, the Mach-E and the F-150 Lightning.

“CATL’s connections to the [Chinese Communist Party] CCP, and its armed wing, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), are extensive and obvious. A Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) report revealed that CATL, thanks to preferential treatment by the CCP, has enjoyed ‘subsidies, tax incentives, favorable procurement deals, and additional policy benefits,’” Moolenaar and Rubio wrote. “These benefits propelled CATL toward its massive 37.5 percent share of the global electric vehicle (EV) battery market, which the company boasted about on X just last month.”

The Biden administration has set ambitious goals for both renewable energy deployment and for electric vehicle proliferation in the U.S. in general, and China hawks in Congress have frequently applied scrutiny to the process to avoid benefiting China.

Last December, the Treasury Department, announcing eligibility rules for electric vehicle tax credits under the Inflation Reduction Act, excluded China, North Korea, Russia and Iran.

In a statement to The Hill, a spokesperson for CATL said “Battery products that CATL sell in the U.S. market are passive products – without any communications hardware or software that allows for remote access or control. CATL’s battery products pose no more of a threat to national security than a brick. CATL is not directly competing with any U.S. companies.”

The Hill has reached out to the Pentagon for comment.

This story was updated at 4:22 p.m.

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