While visiting autoworkers in Michigan, former President Donald Trump was met with chants of “USA! USA!” when he pledged to roll back President Biden’s electric vehicle mandates and revitalize the gas-powered vehicle industry.
The Biden Administration has pledged to convert the federal government’s vehicle fleet from gas-powered to electric by 2030. As a result, automakers have received massive loans to produce electric vehicles.
The Biden Department of Energy announced this past June that it would loan Ford Motor $9.2 million in a joint venture to support the production of electric vehicle batteries across three factories in the United States, the largest such loan in the program office’s history.
Trump has long criticized the Biden Administration’s push towards electric vehicles, pointing to the fact that sales have not matched costs or administration demands. For example, Ford has said that it expects to lose roughly $3 billion in operating profit on its electric vehicle business this year. Executives are hopeful that profits from its gas-engine vehicles will be able to sustain the company until the program pays off.
In the interim, Ford is focusing on cutting its $8 billion operating costs, a high figure among automakers.
“Why is it that these big,