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Jim Farley said Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy's letter contained "basic misunderstandings" and flatly denied proposing a joint-venture framework for Chinese automakers
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Jim Farley pushed back sharply against Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy's assertion that Ford $F had become increasingly tied to Chinese companies, dismissing the charges as "basic misunderstandings, mistruths, whatever words you want to use" that a brief phone call could have settled, he told The Wall Street Journal on Wednesday.
The letter, which Duffy released publicly on Tuesday, charged that Ford was "actively intertwining its future with Chinese state-backed enterprises," citing in particular the Marshall, Michigan battery plant's technology-licensing arrangement with CATL, as well as an agreement under which Geely vehicles are assembled at Ford's Valencia, Spain facility. Duffy also alleged that Farley had proposed a framework at the Detroit Auto Show earlier this year to facilitate joint ventures between Chinese carmakers and U.S. companies.
