Two Republican members of the U.S. Congress asked the U.S. Department of Defense on the 28th to include Chinese battery maker Ningde Times (market value of about 790 billion yuan) on the restricted list of “suspected cooperation with the Chinese military,” arguing that reliance on the Chinese company would threaten U.S. national security. Ningde Times countered that the company's products were “no bigger than a brick” to U.S. national security. In response, Ningde Times said in a statement issued on the 29th that the allegations by the two lawmakers were “baseless” and that its battery products have helped millions of American families and small businesses during power outages caused by natural disasters, extreme weather and grid instability. The statement reads that the battery products sold by Ningde Times in the U.S. market are passive products that do not contain any hardware or software that allows remote access and control, and “are not engaged in any military-related activities.”