China鈥檚 farmland buys in the U.S. are attracting new attention on Capitol Hill.
The House Select Committee on US-CCP Competition, chaired by Michigan Republican John Moolenaar has its eye on a Chinese EV battery firm鈥檚 land buy in that state. He says, 鈥淕otion is a Chinese-based company that it is buying farmland. It is a hundred miles from a National Guard location where a lot of training is done.鈥
And despite Michigan鈥檚 subsidizing a Gotion battery plant on that farmland over local opposition; 鈥淔ortunately, there is a process, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. has jurisdiction over this project. And I hope that they will come back with a report that says, this is not the place for a Chinese-based plant.鈥
The Treasury-led 鈥楥FIUS鈥 looks at national security issues raised by foreign investment and now includes USDA鈥檚 Secretary Vilsack as a member. Moolenaar, interviewed on News Nation, says China鈥檚 presence here, especially near sensitive U.S. military facilities, is no small matter.
Moolenaar says, 鈥淲e鈥檝e seen hundreds of incidents of gate-crashing at military bases from foreign nationals, many of them Chinese.鈥
China鈥檚 U.S. land holdings are less than one percent of foreign-owned acres, but at 350-thousand acres in 2022, it is still a serious concern. USDA is trying to improve its data collection to study the impact of foreign land holdings on rural communities and the exact location of foreign-owned land.
Story by Matt Kaye/Berns Bureau; courtesy of NAFB News Service
