It’s been jokingly suggested, as I posted the other day, that Trump’s agenda is so chaotic and counter productive, that it potentially hurts the fossil fuel industry that the “Drill Baby Drill” agenda was supposed to help.
The trend continues.
Trump is out selling Teslas while his tariffs threaten premier internal combustion brands.
If Democrats suggested this as a fuel efficiency move, they would be pilloried. MAGA just gets in line.
Wall Street Journal:
“America’s most popular pickup truck might not be able to outrun President Trump’s new tariffs on steel and aluminum.
The Ford F-150, the top-selling vehicle in the U.S. and the automaker’s main profit engine, is one of the industry’s biggest users of aluminum. The Trump administration reinstated early Wednesday a blanket 25% tariff on steel imports and boosted the levy on aluminum made outside the U.S. “
The tariffs are the latest Trump administration trade barrier that threatens to inflate already-high car prices. Together, the metals account for more than half the materials that go into cars, and costs from the tariffs likely will get passed along to car buyers, analysts say.
If left in place, they could on average inflate the costs to automakers of building a car by about $400 per vehicle, according to research from Barclays.
The aluminum tax in particular presents a problem for automakers: They are using more of the lightweight metal in cars, but the U.S. has been producing less of it. Most of the high-quality aluminum used in vehicles’ outer bodies starts out as imported aluminum, and there are a dwindling number of domestic alternatives.
Crippling certain auto plants
Ford’s brawny F-150 and Super Duty pickup trucks, the company’s biggest profit generators, are among the most aluminum-intensive vehicles on the market. The company a decade ago converted the trucks to a mostly aluminum exterior, including the hood, doors and truck bed, to save weight and enhance fuel efficiency.