(The Center Square) – President Donald Trump signed an executive order to end the Biden administration’s forced transition to electric vehicles via a tailpipe regulation as one of his first actions as the 47th U.S. president.
The tailpipe emissions rule enacted under the Biden administration seems like a technical regulation but actually created major implications for Americans.
The rule in question would have effectively required a massive shift for Americans to electric vehicles, whether they wanted them or not.
As The Center Square previously reported, the Environmental Protection Agency itself had projected that the new rule would mean fully electric vehicles would comprise two thirds of all new “light duty” and 46% of new medium-duty vehicle sales by 2032. Effectively, that would have affected most consumer vehicles driven by Americans, including SUVs and many pickup trucks.
Currently, electric vehicle sales are well below 10% of the market in the U.S.
“President Trump confirmed what Power The Future has been saying for the 4 years of the disastrous Biden Administration: without government force and their unconstitutional EV mandates coupled with ridiculous subsidies, there would be no green agenda,” Daniel Turner, executive director of the pro-energy workers group, Power the Future, told The Center Square.
The shift in the market was backed in large part due to billions of dollars in federal subsidies. The march toward electrification of the car market may continue but without the same federal pressure and the accelerated timeline.
Trump’s new order calls for “terminating, where appropriate, state emissions waivers that function to limit sales of gasoline-powered automobiles; and by considering the elimination of unfair subsidies and other ill-conceived government-imposed market distortions that favor EVs over other technologies and effectively mandate their purchase by individuals, private businesses, and government entities alike by rendering other types of vehicles unaffordable…”
Trump also froze spending from a $5 billion fund meant to build charging ports in the U.S. Experts project building enough charging stations in the U.S. will cost hundreds of billions of dollars.
Critics had also pointed out the U.S. does not have anywhere close to the charging infrastructure to support this massive increase in electric vehicles, especially in rural areas.
“Now that Presidents are not picking winners and losers in the car industry, EVs will be forced to compete in the free market, ultimately creating a better product, but more importantly, returning government to its proper role,” Turner said. “The green agenda is gasping its last breath as Americans regain their freedom.”
The executive order was one of many on Trump’s first day in office. Trump held a roughly 90-minute press conference narrating executive orders as he signed them.
“Time is short, and President Trump’s to-do list is long undoing the damage of the Biden years and fulfilling his campaign promises,” Colin Reed, a Republican strategist, former campaign manager for U.S. Sen. Scott Brown, R-Mass., and co-founder of South and Hill Strategies, told The Center Square. “The ‘shock and awe’ approach is wise to seize on his recent momentum and strike while the iron is hot.
“The new administration needs to not only use his pen to undo the worst of the Biden executive orders on immigration and energy, but also push the Republican Congress to pass as many of these policies into law to ensure long term stability that can’t be undone by future Democratic administrations,” Reed added.