Former U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers is seeking to fill the U.S. Senate seat vacated by retiring Michigan Sen. Debbie Stabenow, a Democrat. The Republican Rogers is running against current District 7 Democrat U.S. Rep. Elissa Slotkin.

Rogers has agreed to two debates against Slotkin, with the first scheduled on Oct. 8. Among the topics most likely to be discussed is the proposed electric vehicle battery component plant in Green Charter Township outside Big Rapids in Mecosta County. Rogers has been a longtime opponent of the project, while Slotkin only recently announced her skepticism after signing a nondisclosure agreement with Gotion during the early stages of negotiations with the company despite its affiliation with the People’s Republic of China and the Chinese Communist Party.

In a conversation with The Midwesterner, Rogers explained his opposition to Gotion and other Chinese manufacturing companies in Michigan and elsewhere in the U.S., noting national security, economic concerns, and potential environmental risk such endeavors pose.

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“When you talk about national security, we’re inviting into our country a company that has a self-identified association with the Communist Party of China into our community,” Rogers said. “They will bring Chinese engineers to our community to set this up. Already, 85% of an electric vehicle has to get processed in China so you are just compounding our reliance on China.”

He added that electric vehicles require 40% less labor, which he notes is bad for the economic security of U.S. autoworkers.

“I think that hybrids are a better option and, as a matter of fact, one EV takes 500 pounds of critical minerals,” Rogers said. “That same 500 pounds makes 90 hybrids. We don’t have to do this,” he said, referring to EV mandates. “And we don’t need the plant in the community that doesn’t want it here it for a whole bunch of really good reasons.”

Among the reasons Rogers listed was EV fires, which are extremely difficult to extinguish. But chief among his issues with Gotion is concern over national security.

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“I was the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, I served in the United States Army, served as a special agent with the FBI working organized crime,” he said. Speaking of the Chinese, he noted, “They’re very good about getting into critical supply chains, number one, so they control most of the critical minerals in the world.”

He explained either U.S. companies either have to purchase or process nearly 90$ of the minerals needed for EVs from China.

“Number two, they’re very good about getting into these industries to own them,” he said. “They don’t want to be partners, they don’t want any of that. They want customers. Chinese doesn’t have friends, it doesn’t have allies, it has customers pure and simple.”

Rogers noted that the push to mandate EVs would cost American jobs.

“The Democrats mandating what kind of car you have to drive, it’s the Chinese who are building these huge plants on the border of Mexico. They’re going to build these cars, they control the supply chain, so that’s cheaper for them. They use forced labor in China to get those cars to Mexico. They’re going to undercut the U.S. car industry,” he said.

“So all this flailing around about what we have to we have to subsidize our industry to compete with China is just false,” Rogers added. “They need to compete on things that people want to buy. It should be markets not mandates and so that’s where they’re really good, the Chinese, about disrupting our ability to compete and if we lose manufacturing in this country we are lost.”

When asked how his position on Gotion differed from Slotkin’s, Rogers responded: “It couldn’t be more night and day, and the other part of this is a little deceptive. She said when she was first running [she] wouldn’t support an EV mandate. She supported an EV mandate and now is running around trying to sell it. She signed a nondisclosure agreement on a commercial enterprise using taxpayer dollars to get a company that’s tied to the Communist Party of China in this community and this community doesn’t want it. And why? So she doesn’t have to talk about it. I think that’s wrong. It’s bad form for a member, an elected official, a public official to do that. It’s wrong and so I think the fact that we want to push back on all of this Chinese subsidization is she’s just on the wrong side of that from stem to stern. She doesn’t understand the national security threat clearly, certainly doesn’t understand the economic threat,” he said. “Those EV mandates? About 400,000 UAW jobs and there’s about five jobs tied to each one of those UAW jobs here in Michigan. It’s devastating for our economy if they get what they want.”