An executive at Chinese Communist Party-linked Gotion arranged trips to China, shuttled money to a local official, and dug through an opponent’s divorce papers while making deals for a massive battery factory in Michigan.
Gotion, an electric battery company affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party, first proposed a factory in Green Charter Township, Michigan, in 2022. State and local subsidies to the Chinese company will total $715 million. Gotion aims to “break ground soon” and is suing the recently-elected township board for resisting its plans.
The Federalist obtained texts revealing Gotion’s VP of North American manufacturing, Chuck Thelen, maintained a close relationship with Jim Chapman, then-supervisor of Green Charter Township, and apparently called opponents “ignorant racist’s [sic].” Thelen arranged trips to China and dug through the divorce papers of a resident who opposed the project, and his wife gave Chapman $1,000.
Making Inroads
Last year, Thelen offered to bring Chapman to China, and his wife gave the then-supervisor $1,000, according to text messages obtained by The Federalist.
Gotion offered to bring a “number of the community members” to China to view its plant, Chapman told The Federalist. “They offered a number of the community members around here the opportunity to go over and actually look and see what their plant looked like. I happened to be one of those people,” Chapman said. “I wasn’t interested in going, and actually nobody ever went.”
Chapman texted Thelen on Aug. 3, 2023, expressing thanks for the invitation. “Please let your chairman know I am honored by his invitation. Unfortunately ongoing issues in my township preclude [sic] me from being absent for this trip,” Chapman said.
“Gotcha. We are seeing many people that can’t get visas in time. Might reschedule for January after things settle down. Keep the heat off u and other politicians. Would that help?” Thelen replied.
Chapman told him it would help and said he would research renewing his passport according to the texts, which read from the bottom up.
Just weeks later, Thelen contacted Chapman offering to help fund his campaign against a recall, which was ultimately successful.
“Hi jim[,] tracey and I would like to donate to your defense fund. Do u take venmo? I think I heard u say alsonthat [sic] the limit is $1200 that u can accept from a single donor [—] is that correct?” Thelen texted Chapman on Aug. 14, 2023.
Chapman replied with a QR code, which goes to a PayPal fund called “Citizens for Jim Chapman.”
“1200 is the limit. I’m set up to go through PayPal. I have a qr code,” Chapman said.
Thelen asked Chapman if he had a Venmo, and the then-supervisor said no.
“Me neither but my wife has an account that has money to spend. How bout cash?” Thelen said.
Thelen eventually agreed to pay him through “credit.”
The Gotion VP’s wife, Tracey Thelen, paid Chapman $1,000 the same day, according to the then-supervisor’s campaign finance disclosures included in court documents.
Chapman claimed Thelen’s offer and his wife’s same-day payment were unrelated. He also said he did not know she would be paying him, and money would not change his conduct.
“He decided not to, and then his wife had nothing to do — It had nothing to do with Gotion, okay? You guys are trying to make out like there was some kind of bribery involved, and there was not,” Chapman said. “I didn’t know anything about that. Wife came in and gave me some money, the same as anyone else would. What else you want to accuse me of?”
Michigan state law says public officials cannot “solicit or accept a gift or loan of money, goods, services, or other thing of value for the benefit of a person or organization, other than the state, which tends to influence the manner in which the public officer … performs official duties.”
At the time of the donation, Gotion and Green Charter Township officials were working on a development agreement. Thelen and Chapman coordinated over text.
Chapman insisted he had “not taken a red cent from Gotion” or Thelen.
Resisting Gotion
When Lori Brock pulled into her driveway last year, she saw people waiting near a black SUV. Brock said they offered her $22 million for her farm, and she refused. “They’re like, ‘No, you’ve got to see this. It’s a lot of money,’” Brock told The Federalist. “I said, ‘If this is Gotion related, I’m not interested in any way, shape or form.’”
The Gotion plant would originally have been just across the street from Brock’s farm, she said. As Brock became more vocal about opposing it, those sympathetic to the company mounted a pressure campaign. “They’re just vile,” Brock said. “It has been a year of hell dealing with them.”
Last year, one of her mares died of poison, according to Brock. Three days after that, she found oil in her stallion’s water trough. She has since installed cameras across her property and hired armed security. “I lived here for 45 years and never, ever had a problem with anybody messing with my horses until then,” Brock said.
Brock has also faced an environmental investigation — quickly dismissed — into her organic farm and floods of one-star reviews of her real estate business. She said Gotion reached out to her company, trying to fire her. “I fired back, ‘You’re an asshole, I own the company. Good try,’” Brock said.
Thelen and others dug through Brock’s divorce documents, according to the text messages obtained by The Federalist. Thelen told Chapman about his efforts to find dirt on Brock. “Tell me you’ve arranged for karma to bite her,” Chapman texted Thelen on Sept. 2, 2023.
“I stopped at the county. The divorce papers are about 2000 long,” Thelen replied. “Going back Tuesday with some helpers to sort through it.”
Chapman confirmed to The Federalist that “someone” dug through Brock’s divorce papers, but claimed he did not know who. “They were trying to provide proof, documentation to what everybody in this town knows,” Chapman said. “Somebody looked up the fact that she’s a serial liar.”
Referencing Brock’s ex-husband, Thelen said on Sept. 4, 2023, that he was a “smart man to bail out on that skank.”
Thelen also mentioned “a group of ignorant racist’s [sic],” apparently referencing opponents of the Gotion battery factory.
The Federalist reached out to Thelen, but he did not comment in time for publication.
Teri Hook, a nearby resident who opposes Gotion, told The Federalist the project has divided the community.
“Even the people that haven’t been involved necessarily on the pro-Gotion side or the no-Gotion side, we’re all affected because it’s hurting our community,” Hook said. “A whole lot of relationships will never be the same.”
Security Threats
The FBI recently charged five Chinese nationals from the University of Michigan with spying after they allegedly photographed military equipment at Camp Grayling — just 100 miles from the proposed Gotion site. The Michigan Army National Guard was training with the Taiwanese military at the time.
Gotion is a subsidiary of Chinese company Gotion High-tech Co., Ltd. The parent company’s 2022 articles of association dictate the “company shall set up a Party organization and carry out Party activities in accordance with the Constitution of the Communist Party of China.” It says to treat the “party branch as a fighting fortress.”
“The company set up the Gotion High-tech Co., Ltd. Committee of the Communist Party of China,” read the articles. “The Party Committee of the Company shall perform its duties in accordance with the Constitution of the Communist Party of China and other Party regulations.”
Gotion is bound to “ensure and supervise the implementation of the Party’s guidelines, principles and policies in the company.” The Party Committee must take “primary responsibility for comprehensively and strictly governing” the company as a CCP branch, “lead[ing] the ideological and political work, united front work, spiritual civilization construction, enterprise culture construction, labor union, Communist Youth League and other mass work of the Company.”
One of Gotion’s officials was pictured at CCP meetings, The Daily Caller reported in April.
Chapman dismissed any concerns about CCP influence as “totally irrelevant.” He claimed Chinese control over companies like Gotion ends on American soil.
Financial Concerns
Gotion admitted in July it takes subsidies from the Chinese communist government. An updated foreign agents registration filing says “Gotion is partially subsidized through government funding supplied by the People’s Republic of China.”
The company’s project in Green Charter Township also takes funding from the state of Michigan. The Democrat-majority state legislature approved $175 million for the project last year.
Thelen’s deposition in Gotion’s lawsuit, obtained by The Federalist, revealed the company’s “first step” in submitting plans to governments was contacting the Michigan Economic Development Corporation. He said Gotion had an “alliance with the MEDC.”
“We started discussing validity of the project for the State, whether or not it’s something the State wanted and what kind of incentive packages they were willing to provide,” Thelen said.
He said a “document” or “agreement” resulted from the discussions, but a nondisclosure agreement prohibited him from discussing it.
Democrat Gov. Gretchen Whitmer hosted Gotion High-tech Chairman Zhen Li at her Mackinac Island retreat last year, as The Midwesterner reported.
The Federalist also found texts indicating Thelen and Chapman coordinated with Whitmer’s office on the project.
“FYI When Nate called me this morning from gov [sic] office I made sure to expedite EGLE,” Chapman wrote on July 12, 2023, apparently referencing the Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy.
“Cool. I gave the same message to Gretchen. FYI we are getting very close on contract for stste [sic] and right place. I truly hope we have them by end of week, however I am afraid the medc [sic] legal team will not finish on time,” Thelen replied. “We keep pushing.”
Republican state Sen. John Damoose told The Federalist that while on the state Senate appropriations committee, he questioned Gotion representatives about the project. “I was appalled by [the] tenor and tone of the responses I received,” Damoose said. “It seemed as though they were trying to pass the company off as having nothing to do with China, even though they are directly affiliated with Gotion High Tech.”
Damoose said he has opposed the project since the beginning, and state legislators have “done all we can.” He pointed to Gotion High-tech’s involvement in China’s “Belt and Road” initiative, which he said attempts “worldwide economic domination.”
