Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of my bill, H.R. 8631, the Decoupling from Foreign Adversarial Battery Dependence Act. Our world is increasingly reliant on battery technology, from the smartphones in our pockets to the energy storage systems that power our homes and businesses. This dependence underscores a larger issue: Our Nation is becoming increasingly reliant on foreign adversarial entities for the materials and technologies that power these devices, which poses grave risk to our Nation's security and economic stability. As it stands, Communist China produces approximately 80 percent of the world's batteries and roughly 70 percent of the world's lithium-ion batteries. These staggering numbers leave U.S. supply chains vulnerable and our Nation's security at risk. Recently, the United States House Select Committee on Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party, a committee that I am a member of, uncovered information that revealed that at least two of the world's top battery manufacturers, CATL and Gotion High-Tech, are affiliated with Xinjiang Production and Construction Corporation, a paramilitary and CCP-owned entity that is expressly named in the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act statute due to its egregious forced labor practices.…”