Trump targets electric vehicle ‘mandate’ and funding for electric vehicle chargers in sweeping executive orders

Upon his return to office on Monday, President Donald Trump wasted no time in tackling one of his most frequent targets on the campaign trail: electric vehicles and the Biden administration’s policies that have contributed to their rise.

But undoing all of this will take more than paperwork.

One of Trump’s many executive orders, titled “Unleashing American Energy,” pledges to eliminate what the president falsely calls an “electric vehicle (EV) mandate” in order to “promote real consumer choice, essential to economic growth and innovation, removing regulatory barriers to access to motor vehicles. The order also says the Trump administration will consider ending what it calls “unfair subsidies and other ill-conceived government-imposed market distortions that favor electric vehicles over other technologies.”

However, the word “consider” could do a lot of heavy lifting in Trump’s order.

As industry experts, analysts and media, including the Detroit Free Press As noted, fully repealing the Inflation Reduction Act and its electric vehicle tax credits would require an act of Congress. Rolling back the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s emissions regulations, which further spur the growth of electric vehicles, hybrids and plug-in hybrids, would also require a lengthy review process, complete with public hearings and other rule-making processes.

Trump also ordered federal agencies to “immediately suspend the disbursement of funds… including, but not limited to, funds for electric vehicle charging stations made available through the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure Formula Program and the Discretionary Grant Program for Charging and Charging Infrastructure refueling,” directly targeting funding for public DC and AC fast charging. The move could leave the fast-growing charging industry, including Tesla, one of the program’s biggest beneficiaries to date. Much of this funding had already been allocated to States, partly thanks to. accelerated movements in the final days of the Biden administration’s term.

Meanwhile, Trump could face opposition from elected officials within one’s own party which represent states that are seeing significant investments to build electric vehicles in the United States. For example, Hyundai’s new Metaplant in Georgia is the largest economic development project in the history of this state. Other beneficiaries of new investments related to electric or hybrid vehicles include North and South Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky and more. Perhaps that’s why the administration says it will simply “consider” ending some subsidies for electric vehicles.

Trump’s use of the term “mandate” historically refers to EPA rules that require automakers to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions from their new cars starting in 2027, with regulations so strict they would eventually have to have zero-emission vehicles represent between 30 and 50% of new car sales. Contrary to popular opinion, the term “mandate” was used wisely during the election campaign…there has never been an order forcing people to buy electric vehicles. Biden had set a non-binding goal of ensure that 50% of all new vehicle sales are fully electric by 2030.

However, strict fuel economy regulations were helping to push domestic and foreign automakers to build and sell more electric vehicles and batteries, including in North America, which would be the only way for them to be entitled to tax credits. By 2024, a record 8% of new car sales were fully electric. Although the growth rate of electric cars has slowed in recent years and does not match the initially optimistic expectations of automakers, electric vehicles remain the fastest growing new automotive sector. Hyundai and General Motors last year became the first automakers since Tesla to sell more than 100,000 electric vehicles in a year in the United States, and Ford also came close.

But electric vehicle advocates, environmental groups and even some automakers have argued that abandoning Biden-era emissions and fuel economy standards risks putting the U.S. auto industry behind foreign competitors who are investing massively in electrification. Indeed, around half of new cars sold in Europe last year were hybrid, plug-in hybrid or electric, and China is expected to see electric vehicles account for 50% of all new car sales this year. If automakers and related companies in the United States relax their electric vehicle plans – for which they have already allocated $200 billion – they run the risk of being left behind the rest of the world.

Like the Wall Street Journal As we noted today, many of Trump’s executive orders will likely face legal challenges in the weeks and months to come. Today’s orders do not propose any specific policy actions regarding emissions rules, electric vehicle tax credits, or manufacturing incentives.

Perhaps most importantly for the auto industry, today’s executive orders avoided mention of tariffs that would almost certainly drive up new car prices. Trump said Monday that his threatened tariffs on foreign goods (including cars) from Mexico, Canada and China would now be imposed on February 1 instead of “day one,” already walking away of a key promise he made during the election campaign.

Contact the author: patrick.george@insideevs.com