Former President Donald Trump slammed Joe Biden’s push for electrifying road transport on Thursday, the fourth and final night of the Republic National Convention in Milwaukee.
What Happened: “I will end the electric vehicle mandate on day one, thereby saving the auto industry from complete obliteration which is happening right now and saving US customers thousands and thousands of dollars per car,” Trump told the crowd gathered at Fiserv Forum.
The mandate Trump is referring to is the Biden administration’s aim to ensure that a majority of new passenger cars and light trucks sold in the United States are all-electric or hybrids by 2032.
Call For Union President Resignation: Trump further called for the resignation of the United Auto Workers union chief Shawn Fain for what he alleged was allowing foreign EV makers to sell EVs in the country without tariffs by building factories in Mexico.
Trump is seemingly referring to Chinese EV maker BYD’s upcoming factory in Mexico, which has been deemed by some automakers as a way to push lower-priced EVs into the U.S. market while simultaneously evading tariffs imposed on China-made EVs. BYD, however, has often reiterated that they do not intend to enter the U.S. market.
“United Auto Workers should be ashamed for allowing this to happen and the leader of the UAW should be fired immediately,” Trump said. “Every single auto worker, union and nonunion, should be voting for Donald Trump because we are going to bring back car manufacturing and we are going to bring it back fast.”
UAW endorsed Joe Biden for the forthcoming November election in January.
Tariffs On Foreign Players: Trump added that foreign players must build plants in America and their vehicles should be built by American workers if they are to be sold in the country.
“If they don’t agree with us we’ll put a tariff of approximately 100% to 200% on each car and they will be unsellable in the United States. We have long been taken advantage of by other countries,” Trump said. Enforcing foreign players to build in America will also create a massive number of jobs in the country, he added.
The Biden administration has already imposed a tariff of over 100% on electric vehicles made in China.
But “I’m All For Electric”: “By the way, I’m all for electric; they have their application but if somebody wants to buy a gas-powered car, gasoline-powered car, or a hybrid they’re going to be able to do it and we’re going to make that change on day one,” Trump said while also slamming Biden administration for investing highly in putting up EV charging infrastructure.
“AI needs tremendous- literally twice the electricity that’s available now in our country- but instead we’re spending in places where they recharge electric cars,” Trump said while also mentioning a report from The Washington Post which said that the government's $7.5 billion capital allocation to help build EV charging stations across the country resulted in only seven operational ones as of March.
U.S. EV giant Tesla Inc. CEO Elon Musk has previously talked about sharing a good relationship with Trump and slammed Biden over his age. Musk has been publicly endorsing Trump’s presidential reelection bid since Saturday after a shooting incident at Trump's campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.
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