By Jeffrey Newman
Chinese built cars are already being sold in the U.S.. Although no Chinese brand cars are being sold here yet, American and European brands are being sold here. The Buickl Envision SUV, the Volvo S90. Lincoln Nautilus and Polestar 2 are made in China.
Buick Envision SUV: Manufactured in China by GM’s joint venture with SAIC (usually at the Yantai or Shanghai plant) and imported to the United States since 2016. The U.S. Envision you see at dealerships is made in China.
Volvo S90: Assembled in China and sold in the U.S.; Volvo shifted production of the S90 sedan for the American market to China after closing its Swedish plant for this model.
Polestar 2: As an EV spin-off from Volvo (both brands now owned by Geely), the Polestar 2 is made in China and imported to the U.S.
Lincoln Nautilus: Starting with the 2024 model year, the Lincoln Nautilus for the U.S. market is manufactured in China and imported here, rather than being assembled in North America as before
In addition, Chine is the world’s largest suppliers of car parts to the US car makers here. U.S. imports of automotive parts from China have grown significantly. U.S. imports
from China accounted for an estimated 3.9 percent of U.S. automotive parts consumption in 2016 (most
recent year available for U.S. parts production).39 Examining which parts the United States imports from
China provides a clearer picture of China’s participation in the U.S. vehicle manufacturing supply chain.
Chinese parts enter the U.S. automotive supply chain as suppliers of subcomponents for parts
produced in Mexico or Canada. Mexico imported more than $2.2 billion (8.3 percent of such imports) in
automotive parts of HS 8708 in 2018, making China Mexico’s second largest supplier of such parts (after
40 Industry representative, Interview with USITC Staff, September 2018. 41 Li, Kong, and Zhang, “Industrial Upgrading in Global Production Networks,” February 2015, 2. 42 Li, Kong, and Zhang, “Industrial Upgrading in Global Production Networks,” February 2015, 2. 43 USITC, “Tapered Roller Bearings from China (Fourth Review),” September 2018, 25. 44 Minth Group, “Products,” (accessed May 8, 2019); Minth Group, “Introduction,” (accessed May 8, 2019).
Jeffrey Newman is a whistleblower lawyer representing whistleblowers reporting insider trading, doctors who become whistleblowers and Medicare and Medicaid fraud. He also represents whistleblowers in IRS tax evasion cases, SEC violations and tariff fraud cases. Jeff frequently writes on events affecting world economic dynamics including AI. He can be reached at Jeff@JeffNewmanLaw.com or at 978-880-4758
