COLUMBUS, OH – This week, Sherrod wrote a response to the Washington Post in which he stood up for Ohio workers and made the case for cracking down on the Chinese government when it skirts trade laws and harms workers.
Sherrod has called on the Biden Administration to ban Chinese-made electric vehicles and to crack down on Chinese solar products that undercut Ohio manufacturers. As he calls on the Biden administration to do more, Sherrod continues to deliver for Ohio workers, from leading the CHIPS Act to ensure the future of technology is built in Ohio by Ohio workers, to fighting to prevent Nippon Steel from acquiring U.S. Steel, to standing up to presidents of both parties against bad trade deals.
Washington Post: The Case for ‘Made in America’
Senator Sherrod Brown – May 28, 2024
- From batteries to biofuels, from solar panels to the cleanest steel in the world, Ohio workers prove every day that they can lead the world in these industries — they just need a government willing to fight for them.
- People in places like my hometown of Mansfield, Ohio, have lived the consequences of decades of bad policy that sold out American workers. Corporations lobbied for tax breaks and bad trade deals to move production overseas in search of lower wages. And politicians in both parties were all too happy to deliver, in the form of both so-called free-trade agreements and weak trade enforcement.
- We’ve made bipartisan, strategic investments to support American leadership in the industries of the future: semiconductors, solar panels, batteries and biofuels.
- But investments alone are not enough. American businesses can’t compete if they’re constantly dealing with a flood of illegally subsidized imports, no matter how many tax credits they get.
- We know that’s what China does in industries key to global economic dominance, from traditionally important industrial sectors such as steel to strategic emerging markets such as solar panel manufacturing.
- When anyone tries to fight back with enforcement actions, China simply routes its products through other countries, changing nothing but the label on the box.
- That hurts companies like First Solar, which employs about 3,000 workers outside Toledo. Northwest Ohio is the brightest light of the U.S. solar industry. But China is deliberately — and effectively — stifling its growth.
- If we do nothing, China will use the same tactics in the auto industry. It’s why we must ban all Chinese EVs, before China can dump them in our country.
- The auto industry and its supply chain are too important to our economy. Millions of Americans depend on it for their livelihoods. From steel to glass to rubber to semiconductors, autos use and refine so much of our manufacturing output. In Ohio, the auto industry is part of who we are. My wife and I proudly drive Jeeps made in Toledo, by UAW workers.
- China isn’t just cheating our trade laws — it is also aggressively trying to take advantage of tax credits meant for U.S. businesses. And in some cases, the Biden administration is making it worse by the loose way it writes these rules, betraying the intent of the credits.
- Right now, Ohioans in Appalachia are doing exciting work, pioneering technology that could turn coal into graphite. That is exactly the kind of innovation we need — but it won’t able to get off the ground if China can use U.S. tax dollars to corner the market.
- Ohio workers and Ohio communities are not expendable. Any renewable energy future that doesn’t benefit workers and doesn’t result in a strong, growing middle class isn’t a future worth fighting for.
###
