Leading Democrats are accepting political donations bound to bolster the already substantial foothold China has in America. For progressives, an affinity for electric vehicles and an equal desire for unlimited campaign cash - no matter the source - represents a perfect confluence of interests that bears stark national security concerns.
BYD Americas is a US-based subsidiary of a Chinese multinational corporation that has direct ties to the Beijing regime, a requirement for all major companies in China. “Stella Li, a top executive for BYD Americas, and the company itself have given tens of thousands of dollars in campaign cash to Democratic candidates and organizations in California and beyond over the past decade,” The Daily Caller reported on July 20.
Newsom and China Go Back a Long Way
The amounts are not insubstantial. BYD and Li donated more than $40,000 to the Democratic National Committee from 2020-23, the news site states. “The company and Li have also poured more than $30,000 into organizations boosting President Joe Biden’s [now defunct] 2024 reelection effort to date.”
It should not be a surprise that California Governor Gavin Newsom is among the biggest single Democrat recipients of the China EV cash. He took in some $60,000 from Li and BYD from 2018-23, The Daily Caller details. Newsom’s political career was spawned in a Bay Area rife with Chinese communist influence. His mentor, Willie Brown – who helped launch the career of the presumed 2024 Democrat presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris – forged a decades-long close personal alliance with San Francisco political activist Rose Pak, who held massive sway over the city’s Chinese-American voting bloc.
“Though she never held elective office, [Rose Pak] was famous for making and unmaking mayors,” establishment media outlet Politico reported in 2018. “According to four former intelligence officials, there were widespread concerns that Pak had been co-opted by Chinese intelligence,” the news site revealed.
When Newsom won a runoff election to become San Francisco mayor in 2003, he specifically thanked the city’s Chinese-American voting bloc for giving him the victory. “I could not have done it without you,” Newsom gushed.
Democrats are not the only big-name California politicians who have been tied to BYD. Former GOP House Speaker Kevin McCarthy sparked controversy five years ago with his stout support for the company.
In 2019, McCarthy blocked legislation that would have limited Chinese corporations from conducting contracts with US transit systems. BYD operated a plant in McCarthy’s congressional district. CEO Li was a donor to McCarthy's campaigns, and McCarthy spoke at a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the opening of a BYD plant in Lancaster, California, in 2017.
“Kevin McCarthy has been championing a Chinese-owned company that is utilizing our tax dollars to gain a foothold in the American automotive industry,” Scott Paul, president of the Alliance for American Manufacturing, told a prominent Washington newspaper at the time. “This is a company that is clearly championed by the Chinese government, that has ambitions to dominate the global auto market, and so giving a foothold to it in the American transit market . . . seems to be a really, really risky proposition.”
‘Could Pose a Serious Risk to US Citizens’
In February, the Biden administration ordered an investigation into the dangers inherent with electric “smart cars” that can store information on the Americans who purchase them. Think TikTok on four wheels.
“These vehicles are connected to the internet. They collect huge amounts of sensitive data on the drivers – personal information, biometric information, where the car goes,’’ Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo stated. “So it doesn’t take a lot of imagination to figure out how a foreign adversary like China, with access to this sort of information at scale, could pose a serious risk to our national security and the privacy of US citizens.’’
“I’m not going to let that happen on my watch,” Biden said of the looming threat.
As he made this apparently hollow pledge, was he aware that the DNC and his own now-abandoned re-election campaign machinery had been showered with cash from the leading Chinese EV company operating in America?
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