New York Times via email:
Average U.S. gasoline prices hit $3.98 per gallon on Tuesday, according to AAA, on the cusp of a level that was last hit when Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022.
The last month has seen the second-largest gas price spike in three decades, with average prices climbing more than 30 percent since the war in Iran effectively shuttered the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow waterway that conveys up to a fifth of the world’s oil.
Though there’s no hard and fast rule that dictates exactly what choices consumers make at $4, $5, and $6 per gallon, higher gas prices are already stressing household budgets. At $4 per gallon, more than half of Americans said they’d change their driving behavior, according to a 2022 survey by AAA. More recent data has also shown that Americans are delaying some forms of spending.
The most important EV of 2026 has almost arrived. Rivian just announced the full lineup and details on the R2, the two-row, five-seat SUV that will make the American EV startup’s vehicles affordable for many more drivers. As promised, Rivian will begin deliveries this spring — but only on the top-end model. If you want to buy an R2 for less than $50,000, you’re going to be left waiting until the end of next year.
The R2’s arrival is truly a make-or-break moment for Rivian. The brand wowed the world with its electric pickup prototype in 2018; the SUV version, R1S, sold prestige EVs to plenty of well-heeled buyers who weren’t looking for a truck. The company now sits where Tesla sat in the late 2010s, just before the Model 3 and Model Y arrived — having lived through years of economic uncertainty, now hoping its mass-market offerings can elevate it from niche brand to large-scale car company. R2’s success would accomplish that and pave the way for the even more affordable R3 that is supposed to get Rivian into the $30,000s.
There’s every reason to think R2 will take them there. At the dollars-and-cents level, the vehicle is basically on par with its most obvious competitor in two-row EV crossovers, the Model Y, which also costs about $58,000 in its most powerful form. The Tesla is a little cheaper at the low end, with a basic version starting around $40,000.
Then again, the Model Y, while it has been recently refreshed, is a vehicle that’s been on the market for half a decade and isn’t as exciting as it used to be. Plus, Rivian doesn’t have the political baggage of being owned by Elon Musk. Other competitors that could undercut the R2 in price — like the Ford Mustang Mach-E, Chevy Equinox or Blazer EV, and Hyundai Ioniq 5 — are quality vehicles that don’t feel quite as capable, exciting, or fresh.
First out of the gate will be the R2 Performance, a souped-up edition that will come in a limited Launch Edition this spring. The Performance variant starts around $58,000, but with electric muscle to match the high sticker price: dual motors, 656 horsepower, 0 to 60 in just 3.6 seconds, and enough battery to reach a Rivian-estimated 328 miles of range. (The brand says it’s still awaiting its official EPA estimates.)
GENERAL MOTORS JUST ROLLED OUT A CAR that’s perfect for the moment. It’s the 2027 Chevrolet Bolt—a relatively cheap, all-electric subcompact that will let you drive right past gas stations, and dodge those high prices from the war in Iran.
But if you want a Bolt, you’d better act fast, because they won’t be on dealer lots for long. GM has already confirmed that production will end next year. The plan is to convert the Bolt’s factory in Kansas City back to manufacturing vehicles with internal combustion engines.
GM says it made its decision to limit the Bolt a while ago, and remains committed to producing other EVs. That’s almost certainly true. But it’s also true that GM has dialed back its overall EV ambitions—by, for example, shelving plans to convert more factories to EV production—and that other companies are doing the same. Just this past week, Honda announced it was scrapping plans for three EVs it had been preparing to manufacture at factories in the United States.
There’s no single, simple explanation for the retrenchment. But a big part of the story is Donald Trump. Since taking office, he has launched an all-out assault on EVs—by working with Republicans in Congress to eliminate tax breaks for vehicle production and purchases, and by using his regulatory powers to gut federal and state emissions standards that favored fuel efficiency.
“It wasn’t just the subsidies that Trump removed,” Corey Cantor, research director at the Zero Emission Transportation Association, told me. “It was the fuel economy standards. It was the California regulations. So it was almost a triple whammy of policy pullback.”