Tesla Signs Battery Deals with Two Suppliers in Communist China

Tesla has signed battery material supply deals with two companies in Communist China, according to recent filings. The supply deals are further evidence of Elon Musk’s cozy relationship with the Communist dictatorship.

Electrek reports that Tesla has secured battery material supply deals with two large Chinese companies in a move that will ensure battery supply to support its electric vehicle production remains active for years to come.

Batteries are in high demand at the moment as automakers looking to move into the electric vehicle business scramble to secure as much supply as possible as it will impact how many vehicles they can produce.

Ford and GM have both announced plans to secure critical minerals and battery supply to support the production of 600,000 and 1 million electric vehicles by 2025. As Tesla only sells electric vehicles, the supply of batteries is a huge factor for the company compared to others like Ford and GM which also produce regular gas-powered vehicles.

Bloomberg recently reported:

Zhejiang Huayou Cobalt Co. and CNGR Advanced Material Co. signed pricing agreements with the electric-vehicle giant for supplies until the middle of this decade, according to separate stock-exchange statements from the companies. The deals are for ternary precursor materials — chemical cocktails that are key to storing energy in lithium-ion batteries.

Tesla has been expanding its operations in China for some time now and is working on building further roots in the country. Breitbart News has previously reported on Tesla’s close ties to China and Elon Musk’s praise of the communist country.

In February, Breitbart News reported that Tesla had plans to begin construction on a new plant in Shanghai as part of its efforts to grow its presence in the country. The new facility will more than double its production capacity in China to meet the growing demand for its vehicles in the country and other markets.

In his book Red-Handed, Peter Schweizer, Breitbart News senior contributor, the president of the nonpartisan Government Accountability Institute (GAI), and the best-selling author of Clinton Cash and Profiles in Corruption, focuses on how money-grabbing Big Tech firms have placed the privacy of their users and U.S. national security at risk in an attempt to appease China.

Red-Handed also explains Elon Musk’s torrid love affair with the country’s communist dictatorship. After denying he would open Tesla factories in China, Musk dramatically changed his tune.

According to Red-Handed:

Then Beijing rolled out the red carpet: Chinese government–backed banks coughed up $1.6 billion in subsidized loans. And the regulatory red tape to build in China was eliminated by government authorities. “What surprised me is how little time it took for the regulatory process to get approved by the Chinese government,” explained Ivan Su, an analyst at Morningstar Inc. The enormous plant was built in less than a year.

Musk arrived in the country for the groundbreaking ceremony and met with top-ranking officials. Two days later, he was meeting with Vice Premier Li Keqiang in the private compound reserved for high- ranking visitors. “I love China very much and I am willing to come here more,” Musk reportedly told Li. The vice premier offered to make him a permanent resident in the country.

Musk has heavily praised China in the past, at one point complimenting the country for “leading the world in renewable energy generation and electric vehicles.”

Breitbart News reporter John Hayward wrote:

On Twitter, Musk was responding to an observation that China allegedly has far higher wind power capacity in megawatts than the United States and European countries — 328,973 megawatts for China versus 132,738 for runner-up America.

China is the world’s worst polluter by a considerable margin, and it does not rely on wind or solar power for the bulk of its electricity — no large country can power fleets of electric cars with windmills. China burns titanic amounts of coal to obtain most of its power, more than from all other sources combined, and its use of coal is steadily increasing.

Musk’s Tesla has extensive business interests in China, which he evidently feels obliged to protect by flattering the regime in Beijing, even though it is the antithesis of everything he claims to believe about free speech and free enterprise. Musk clearly knows this, since he has a Weibo account. More disturbingly, Tesla has actively encouraged China’s vast censorship machine to silence criticisms of its products on social media.

Musk does not just praise China for using electric cars and windmills — he has praised the Chinese government as more concerned with the welfare of its people than Western nations and described Chinese workers as more intelligent and “hard-working” than Americans.

Tesla opened a high-profile showroom in China’s Xinjiang region, home of the oppressed Uyghur Muslims, in January despite an international outcry about forced labor and other human rights violations. China eagerly used Tesla’s operation in Xinjiang for propaganda to whitewash the Uyghur genocide.

The Chinese Communist regime is beginning to reciprocate Musk’s rhetorical support, for example by denouncing all criticism of Tesla and its CEO as “political depravity” in January. In April, Chinese state media cranked out a string of editorials taking Musk’s side in a spat with fellow billionaire Jeff Bezos of Amazon.

Read more at Electrek here.

Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship. Follow him on Twitter @LucasNolan