Michigan voters this week cast their lot with Republican frontrunner Donald Trump and Democrat Bernie Sanders, registering the angst America’s blue-collar workers feel over globalisation, trade and China.

But not all of them, perhaps. From his perch in America’s rust belt, Randy Adams, a 55-year-old veteran of a US motor parts industry that has endured years of struggle, rejected both of the rising populists. He is instead a newly-minted fan of China.

It is a political stance born of a recent change in his personal circumstances. Since late last year Mr Adams has been working as a supervisor for Fuyao Glass, a rapidly expanding Chinese company, inside what by the end of the year is predicted to be the world’s largest motor glass factory by production volume.