DJI is Suing the US Government: Who is going to win?

After 16 months of unanswered correspondence to the United States Department of Defense seeking explanation of why they were designated as a Chinese military company, and after being redesignated in January of 2024 without notice of reason or justification, DJI was left with no choice but to seek judicial relief.

They informed the Department of Defense in September of 2024 of their intent and only then were they provided with a courtesy copy of the internal report that gives the rationale for the designation. It turns out this report is full of deficiencies, inaccuracies, and basically junior reporter level research that led to the designation.

I’m going to post a link to the 103-page complaint in the video description down below for you to Review. I have to say that it’s very enlightening and it further demonstrates with pretty clear evidence that the effort to defame and repudiate the world’s largest drone manufacturer has been intentional, albeit poorly executed and downright sloppy.

Historical Context

In 1999, a statute of the National Defense Authorization Act called Section 1237 was added. That section directed the Secretary of Defense to compile a list of communist Chinese military companies. This was to identify any companies that were owned, operated, or basically had any connection at all to the Chinese military. For 20 years, not a single company was added to that list. Nothing. And then over 7 months’ time, it started adding a bunch of companies to this list.

In 2021, the National Defense Authorization Act included Section 1268, which more clearly defined how a company would be designated as a CMC. This was because some of the companies that they designated over those 7 months actually were taken off the list because the standards that were set previously were actually putting people on the list that should not have been on a list, like private companies were being designated when in fact they were not in any way associated with the Chinese military.

So in 2021, they added 1268 and that helped further kind of define what it takes to be on this list. So the company had to either be directly or indirectly owned, controlled, or beneficially owned by, or in an official or unofficial capacity acting as an agent of or on behalf of the People’s Liberation Army or any other organization subordinate to the Chinese Communist Party, or secondly, they had to be a military-civil fusion contributor to the Chinese defense industrial base.

DJI’s Designation and Response

On October 5th of 2022, the Department of Defense added DJI to the CMC list without notice or explanation. DJI was not the only company added to this list. The problem is these companies, including DJI, were not informed of why they were added to this list. They just put them on the list. And DJI points out that they do not meet either of the requirements to be placed on the CMC list. They are not connected to the People’s Liberation Army, nor are they a military fusion contributor.

The Department of Defense submitted nothing to DJI explaining why they were added to this list. In May of 2023, through outside Legal counsel, DJI attempted to contact the Department of Defense to let them know they were wrongly added to the CMC list. DJI made repeated attempts to engage in discussion, which were never responded to until the Department of Defense finally sent an email to DJI. They stated that they needed to state the rationale for why the statutory criteria do not apply and to provide additional information supporting their request to be removed.

So basically, DJI was not told why they were added to the CMC list, but they were asked to submit reasons why they shouldn’t be on the list. So DJI, doing as requested, in July of 2023 submitted a petition to be removed from the CMC list. Their reasoning was that, as Section 1268 states, a designation must be made on an ongoing basis based on the most recent information available, and the most recent information available did not check a single box that requires a company to be placed on the list.

Legal Action and Its Implications

In September, DJI requested a meeting to discuss the petition, only to be deflected by the Department of Defense to request the information through the Freedom of Information Act. So they did. The Department of Defense said that they would respond to this request by December 15th of 2023. Do you think they responded? Of course not. Then the DOD kicked the can down the road to July 19th of 2024, 7 months later. And do you think they met that date to provide the information? No, they kicked the can again to November 25th of 2024.

So basically, this past September, DJI pretty much had enough. They informed the Department of Defense of their intent to sue, and then all of a sudden, guess what? 4 days later, they magically sent them this report that supposedly caused them to be listed, which was dated from November of 2023. The report, according to DJI’s legal counsel, is pretty much rubbish. It is full of errors and fails to provide any evidence that DJI meets the criteria to be included on the CMC list.

DJI tells the Department of Defense that the report is egregiously inaccurate and they request to be removed from the list, but the Department of Defense says nope, no thanks. So here we are, headed to litigation. Some of the reasons listed in the report go back as far as 6 years ago, when it’s very clear that any designation must be based on the most recent information. The report also does not include anything about the petition that DJI filed in July of 2023 to be delisted. That petition provided evidence of DJI’s business and ownership structure that would have immediately led to their removal from the CMC list.

Conclusion

Now, I strongly suggest that you go ahead and take the time to read that complaint. I have it listed in the video description. You can see how, based on the criteria to get put on this list, that DJI should not be on the CMC list based on so many inaccuracies of this DOD report.

The best thing about this complaint and forcing the DOD to address the situation: the world will finally get to see the truth. When something gets to this point, all of the information will come out. The lawyers get to see everything on both sides, and eventually, the general public will see it too. It all comes to light.

So not only will the DJI lawyers get to see everything that has been going on in the Department of Defense with this matter, but the federal government lawyers will also get to dig deep into the organizational structure of DJI. And if there’s a connection to the Chinese military, then they will find it. If DJI is truly as bad as our government says they are, it will be put on display. If our government has been targeting a private company for no reason other than to stifle competition, then that will be put on display too.

If DJI were truly doing everything our government has been saying they are, don’t you think that their legal team would say, “Uh, you know, if you do this, the truth is going to come out. People are going to find out about what you’re actually doing.” So in my opinion, this is a genius move by DJI because it will expose everything.

And I’m going to say this right now: as most of you know, this channel relies heavily on DJI products for it to be successful. I have a lot of skin in this game, and I want them to succeed, as well as thousands of others who use their products to do their jobs, to continue to succeed. But if it is shown that everything we are being told about DJI by our government is true, I will be the first one to kick them to the curb. But there has to be proof. I’m sorry, but just saying “TRUST me, I know more than I can tell you” does not work in this day and age. That may have worked before the internet and social media, but the information flows too freely now for people to accept the narrative that is presented to them. There has to be evidence these days, clear-cut evidence.

Now we’re going to learn a lot in the coming weeks and months, and when the dust settles, our country can hopefully get back to saving lives, helping farmers do their jobs, protect our infrastructure, and so much more using the best tools available without the fear of having them taken away.

Now my ultimate hope is that someday we do have an American company that can offer what DJI does. I would love to put out endless comparison videos between DJI and a new American drone company or companies. I look forward to that day.

So let me know what you think about all this in the comments. I would love to have the discussion with you. Now if you want to hear my opinion on what I think will happen next, I’m going to post a video for my channel members talking about how I think this is going to go down. Now if you’re thankful for my efforts to keep you informed and you want to see that video, consider joining the channel as a member for as little as $1.99 a month. It’s the best way that you can help this channel continue to operate.

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