{"id":14687,"date":"2023-06-28T05:32:47","date_gmt":"2023-06-28T10:32:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/?p=14687"},"modified":"2023-06-28T05:32:51","modified_gmt":"2023-06-28T10:32:51","slug":"georgia-governor-attacks-bidens-electric-vehicle-policy-at-federally-backed-battery-plant","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/?p=14687","title":{"rendered":"Georgia governor attacks Biden’s electric vehicle policy at federally-backed battery plant"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Georgia<\/a> Gov. Brian Kemp<\/a> is escalating his attack on President Joe Biden\u2019s electric vehicle policy, speaking Tuesday at the groundbreaking for a company that received more than $100 million to refine graphite for electric batteries from the infrastructure law Biden signed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cGeorgia\u2019s electric mobility boom is taking place because our state is second to none for companies looking to invest, relocate, expand, and innovate \u2013 not because the federal government continues to put their thumb on the scale, favoring a few companies over the industry as a whole,\u201d Kemp said, according to advance remarks of his speech at Anovion Technologies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The remarks are unusually partisan for a factory groundbreaking. Anovion’s $800 million investment promises 400 new jobs in rural Bainbridge, in the state’s far southwest corner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Georgia has been a top beneficiary of a nationwide electric vehicle investment boom, with more than 40 electric vehicle-related projects since 2020 pledging $22.7 billion of investment and 28,400 jobs in the state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen President Biden and others falsely try to take credit for Georgia\u2019s success, don\u2019t forget that next year is an election year,” Kemp said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Republican governor planned this attack knowing Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff<\/a> would likely share his stage at the groundbreaking. Ossoff has been Georgia\u2019s most high-profile supporter of Biden\u2019s electric vehicle policies. The two could be rivals for the Senate seat in 2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ossoff has argued that Georgia’s investment boom wouldn’t happen without Democratic policies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt is bizarre to attend a groundbreaking and launch a political attack on the very policy that made the groundbreaking possible,\u201d Ossoff told The Associated Press before the event, where he was invited but not scheduled for a speaking role. \u201cThe governor is throwing a panicked political tantrum over the success of federal manufacturing policies in his own state.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kemp has always opposed the Inflation Reduction Act, which is pumping billions into electric vehicle subsidies. He’s disagreed in particular with its domestic content standards, meant to increase America’s clean-energy manufacturing capacity. They make tax incentives on electric vehicles available only when the vehicle, the battery, and key raw materials in the battery are all made in the United States.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hyundai Motor Group, which is building a $5.5 billion plant to assemble electric vehicles and batteries in Ellabell, Georgia, near Savannah, has said the tax credits are unfair because its electric vehicles aren’t currently eligible. Kemp referenced the South Korean conglomerate’s criticism in his speech Tuesday, saying \u201cthat approach simply doesn\u2019t work.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While Ossoff’s fellow Democratic senator, Raphael Warnock, had proposed making the tax credits more flexible, Ossoff has emphasized that benefits will be available to Hyundai once the Ellabell plant starts production.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kemp has said it’s wrong to credit Biden for the boom, noting that Rivian Automotive announced a $5 billion plant east of Atlanta in December 2021, while Hyundai announced in May 2022, both before Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For his part, Kemp said again Tuesday that he wants to make Georgia the \u201ce-mobility capital of the nation\u201d as his second-term legacy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But Ossoff has claimed credit for Biden and Democrats, including for solar panel plant expansions in northwest Georgia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Things got tenser when Hyundai and LG Energy Solution announced a $4.3 billion electric battery plant in May at Hyundai\u2019s new complex. Ossoff assertively trumpeted the news while Kemp was in Israel, a move that chafed some Kemp administration officials.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kemp attributed Anovion’s choice of location to state and local officials, saying \u201cthey don\u2019t posture or showboat, and they don\u2019t try to steal credit.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The governor himself is in an awkward spot politically, with many Republicans opposing electric vehicles. Weeks after the Hyundai battery announcement, former President Donald Trump told the Georgia Republican convention that he would abolish Biden’s electric vehicle policies, saying \u201cFirst day in office, I\u2019ll be ending all of that,” to cheers from a crowd in Columbus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kemp who didn’t attend that convention out of dissatisfaction with state the party’s leadership, has tried to persuade Republicans to break off their love affair with Trump, while at the same time opposing a Democratic president whose administration has lavished electric vehicle makers with billions in incentives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cUnlike top-down systems like China\u2019s, and those advocated by some on the federal level, we aren\u2019t dictating how this growth happens,\u201d Kemp said Tuesday. \u201cWe aren\u2019t picking winners and losers. We\u2019re letting the market drive this innovation and expansion.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But it’s hard to say Anovion is solely a creature of the market. The Chicago-based firm’s Georgia factory will make synthetic graphite \u2014 a key ingredient for lithium batteries \u2014 benefitting from the content standards that are boosting domestic graphite demand. It won $117 million in federal financing to build and improve factories. And it may be able to claim federal tax credits of 10% on the costs of producing graphite as well as 30% on its factory investment, both part of the Inflation Reduction Act.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cManufacturing is coming back to America and it\u2019s coming to Georgia, as we intended when we passed these infrastructure and manufacturing policies,\u201d Ossoff said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

independent<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp is escalating his attack on President Joe Biden\u2019s electric vehicle policy, speaking Tuesday at the groundbreaking for a company that received more than $100 million to refine graphite for electric batteries from the infrastructure law Biden signed. \u201cGeorgia\u2019s electric mobility boom is taking place because our state is second to none for companies looking […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":14689,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,1154],"tags":[1226,1169,9242,3353,2005,1506],"class_list":["post-14687","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","category-trending","tag-attack","tag-biden","tag-electric-vehicle-policy","tag-federal-government","tag-georgia","tag-governor"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14687","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14687"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14687\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14690,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14687\/revisions\/14690"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/14689"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14687"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14687"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14687"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}