US auto giants give car buyers mixed messages about EV plans | Official Website of Louis Velazquez, entrepreneur, finance guy and tech innovator

Executives at the Big 3 Detroit automakers seem to be caught in the middle.

After over a decade of U.S. government support for their electric vehicle initiatives, President Donald Trump’s administration has made a fiscal and regulatory U-turn.

In July, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced that it was starting to roll back 31 environmental regulations — including the 2009 endangerment finding, which concluded that greenhouse gases threaten public health and welfare — giving the agency the imperative to limit them.

Trump administration’s thoughts on the 2009 EPA Endangerment Finding

“The Trump Administration will not sacrifice national prosperity, energy security, and the freedom of our people for an agenda that throttles our industries, our mobility, and our consumer choice while benefiting adversaries overseas,” said EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin.
“The 2009 Endangerment finding has had an enormously negative impact on the lives of the American people. For more than 15 years, the U.S. government used the finding to pursue an onslaught of costly regulations – raising prices and reducing reliability and choice on everything from vehicles to electricity and more,” said Energy Secretary Chris Wright.
“Since 2009, I’ve consistently argued that the endangerment finding required a consideration of downstream costs imposed on both mobile sources like cars and stationary sources like factories,” said OMB Administrator Jeff Clark. Source: EPA press release

So after 16 years of building out their EV ambitions at the behest of the government, U.S. OEMs like Ford and General Motors have had to pivot.

Major U.S. automakers must pivot following the EPA’s rollback of environmental regulations.

Photo by Giovanni Badalamenti on Unsplash

Ford, GM follow President Trump’s lead on EVs

Like most of Ford’s Model e lineup, the F-150 Lightning hasn’t been very popular since its debut in 2022.

According to reports, executives at Ford are considering ending the F-150 Lightning experiment, though no final decision has been reached.

Ford F-150 Lightning sales by year

2022: 15,617
2023: 24,165
2024: 33,510
2025: 24,577 (to date) Source: Ford Authority

Ford Authority indicated that the automaker paused production of the F-150 Lightning in October due to an aluminum shortage. So the company is debating whether to keep its Rouge Electric Vehicle Center in Dearborn, Michigan, idle.

Ford has the capacity to build 150,000 Lightning vehicles a year, but the company expects to lose approximately $5 billion on EVs this year, following a similar loss of around the same amount last year.

Rival General Motors is in the same boat.

General Motors had a strong third quarter, where it raised its profit guidance to between $9.75 and $10.50 per share for the year, up from its previous view between $8.25 and $10 per share.

However, even though GM EVs had a strong quarter, the company said it will halt the expansion of its electrified portfolio.

“To meet these requirements, we aggressively expanded our electric vehicle capacity,” Barra added. “However, with the evolving regulatory framework and the end of federal consumer incentives, it is now clear that near-term EV adoption will be lower than planned. That is why we are reassessing our EV capacity and manufacturing footprint.”

General Motors Q3 facts at a glance

U.S. market share: 17%
Electric vehicles sold: 67,000
EV market share: 16.5%
Dealer inventory: Down 16% year over year
EV inventory: Down 30% since June

Earlier this month, GM announced that it will lay off approximately 1,750 workers who were involved in the development of electric vehicles and batteries. That includes roughly 1,200 workers at its Detroit-Hamtramck Factory Zero, which will operate with only one shift starting in January.

Ford, GM say they remain committed to EVs, despite curbing production

Despite actions that may suggest otherwise, Ford and GM claim that they remain committed to EVs and EV production as the long-term future of their companies.

“We do see EVs as being our North Star. The consumer feels or indications that we have really strong EVs, as we’ve seen our market share grow throughout this year. We think we’ve got EVs people want to have,” said GM CEO Mary Barra during the company’s third-quarter earnings call.

However, Barra admits that the EV market is murky now that U.S. consumers no longer have the $7,500 federal tax credit to help offset the cost of their purchases.

Meanwhile, Ford CEO Jim Farley is also fully committed to an EV future, but he likewise sees the company having to do a lot of work to get where it wants to be.

“We are in a global competition with China, and it’s not just EVs. And if we lose this, we do not have a future Ford,” Farley said earlier this year at the Aspen Ideas Festival.

Ford is saving money by pulling back on EV spending

Ford has been warning about its EV business for years.

Ford has known since at least 2023 that EVs would be a tough sell in America.

It postponed a $12 billion EV manufacturing investment in October 2023 that would have expanded manufacturing capacity, with former CFO John Lawler telling CNBC at the time that “the customer is going to decide what the volumes are.”

Ford Model e losses by year

2025: $3.6 billion (year to date)
2024: $5.1 billion
2023: $4.7 billion
2022: $2.2 billion

Ford has known since at least 2023 that EVs would be a tough sell in America.

“Being number two to Tesla in EVs, we’ve learned a lot the last three years. Andhaving a full range of truck hybrids, we’ve learned a lot… And there’s no doubt about it that we’ve had to change our EV spending and capital allocation pretty massively,” Farley said during the company’s second-quarter earnings call.