Citing security risks, US states move to bar Chinese land purchases and projects with China ties

Virginia governor nixes a US$3.5 billion battery plant, and 2,500 new jobs for his state, because Ford Motors has a Chinese partner on the project

Legislative bans on Chinese land ownership, and in some cases even real estate, are pending in three states, and others have limited farmland purchases

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Mark Magnierin Danville, Virginia

Published: 2:00am, 13 Feb 2023Updated: 10:47am, 13 Apr 2023

Odell Hutson let out a sigh as he recalled his nearly four decades employed at the massive Dan River textile mill here in southern Virginia, watching it slide from revered icon to bankrupt hulk, leaving in its wake rising crime, unemployment and shattered dreams.

Since its 2004 bankruptcy, local officials have worked hard to reboot Danville – recently ranked Virginia’s poorest city – only to receive a major setback last month when Gov. Glenn Youngkin nixed a potential Ford Motors project with thousands of well-paying jobs because of its Chinese partner.

“This Ford plant would’ve been a big deal,” said Hutson, an engineer with a grizzled beard and self-possessed smile. “I don’t like the idea of foreign companies owning all of our assets. But that plan was to hire 2,500 people. That would’ve been a big kick in the pants to get this place going.”

Ford’s partner in the prospective US$3.5 billion project, Fujian-based Contemporary Amperex Technology (CATL), was a “front” for the Chinese Communist Party, a “dictatorial political party that only has one goal: global dominance”, said Youngkin.

“This Ford plant would’ve been a big deal for this town,” says Odell Hutson of Danville, Virginia. Photo: Mark Magnier

Danville’s industrial “megasite” park remains empty more than a decade after it opened, part of a wave of recent legislation, executive action and rhetoric aimed at excluding Chinese from securing US property or farms, from Virginia to Texas to Congress, where a newly elected Republican-led House is flexing its muscle.

That leaves Asian-Americans fearful that overly broad national security provisions will boomerang, subjecting them to more violence and discrimination.