Senate Bill Seeks to Tariff Chinese Vehicles Out of Existence

This week, Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO) is introducing legislation to increase tariffs on imported Chinese vehicles this week with the stated goal of dealing with the “existential threat posed by China.”

The bill seeks to raise the base tariff rate from 2.5 percent to 100 percent, including vehicles owned by Chinese-based automakers that are assembled in places like Mexico. With Chinese exports already under a 27.5 percent tariff, the changes would effectively make those products prohibitively expensive.

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Biden Admin Withdraws Nomination for NHTSA Leadership

The White House withdrew the nomination of Ann Carlson to head the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) on Tuesday, following criticisms that she was unqualified to fill the role. Despite Carlson serving as the acting administrator since September, the Senate Commerce Committee had accused her of being a career environmentalist with no formal background in roadway safety.


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Congress Pushes Back Against AM Radio's Decline

The elderly folks in Congress don’t often understand new technology, but they perk right up when somebody tries to take away something they are familiar with. That’s the scene playing out in Washington right now, as lawmakers want to pump the brakes on automakers cutting AM radio from new cars.

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Mrs. Barra Goes to Washington

General Motors CEO Mary Barra met with Senate Commerce Committee Chair Maria Cantwell, (D-WA) and fellow Democratic Commerce Committee member Gary Peters in Washington D.C. on Thursday to help lobby for favorable legislation pertaining to self-driving cars. Though it sounds like they were already on board with whatever GM wanted, as they’ve already started repeating familiar rhetoric designed to encourage legislators to tweak Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards (FMVSS).


The meetings coincide with Barra's press events discussing how the automaker would like to implement artificial intelligence (including the infamous ChatGPT) into future products.

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Senators Seek to Overturn U.S. Emission Rule for Heavy Trucks

On Thursday, a number of Republican senators announced they would be attempting to overturn the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) rules designed to cap emissions on heavy-duty trucks. Finalized by the EPA in December, under guidance from the Biden administration, the new rules are supposed to be 80 percent more stringent than the current standard. However, critics have alleged the updated limits effectively benefit large shipping companies by making it too difficult for smaller trucking companies or independent operators to comply.

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Sen. Manchin Proposes Bill to Force Treasury to Finalize EV Tax Credit Guidance

Despite the United States having an entirely new EV tax credit scheme under the so-called Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), there’s nobody adhering to it right now. That’s because the Treasury Department decided to delay issuing specific guidance on battery matters until March, nullifying any restrictions based on content requirements. While this means more automakers have been able to take advantage of government subsidies, it also means they haven’t been required to follow any of the stipulations outlined in the IRA for 2023.

Senator Joe Manchin (D-WV) believes this is unacceptable and has advanced legislation that would effectively force the U.S. Treasury to do its job.

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Automakers Still Dissatisfied, Lobbying Continues


Automakers are growing concerned about the future now that it looks like people have finally reached their breaking point in regard to elevated vehicle pricing. While the industry is citing inflation in the general sense, the truth of the matter is that companies’ own inability to manufacture vehicles and parts at anything approaching a normal pace resulted in price increases that vastly outpaced the devaluation of your preferred currency. This was made far worse by dealerships affixing their own markups to just about every model that compares favorably to walking. 

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U.S. Senate Preps More Money for Auto Industry


Senate Democrats have settled on how to funnel more money into the automotive sector using all-electric vehicles and environmentalism. Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and West Virginia's Joe Manchin have reportedly agreed on a proposal that would expand the $7,500 tax credit for EVs while also introducing a new $4,000 subsidy for used models.


But that's just to kick things off. The legislative package is likewise said to include $369 billion that's been earmarked for climate and energy spending. For automakers, that means massive financial help from the government whenever they want to convert their existing factories into the kind that build all-electric vehicles. Though it may not be limited to EVs, as the updated language now makes fuel cell vehicles similarly eligible for the proposed industry subsidization.


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White House May Propose Gas Tax Holiday [Updated]

National fuel prices are currently averaging right around $5.00 per gallon in the United States. However, there are plenty of states with stations listing gasoline well above $6.00 per gallon with diesel being driven even higher. This has started to wreak havoc on the trucking industry, which is now seeing companies pausing shipments to renegotiate contracts, and infuriated consumers who remember a gallon of gas being $2.17 during the summer of 2020.

Earlier this year, Congress and the White House suggested suspending the federal fuel tax to alleviate the financial burden. But the notion was walked back, as prices were relatively low at the time (roughly $3.50 per gallon) and criticisms swelled that this simply exchanged one problem for another. Four months later and things are looking rather desperate, with the Biden administration revisiting the premise of pausing fuel tax to help soften the blow of record-breaking prices at the pump.

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U.S. Congress Holds Hearing on Increased Traffic Deaths

A U.S. House of Representatives subcommittee conducted a hearing to discuss surging traffic deaths on Wednesday. In 2021, traffic deaths surged by over 10 percent over the previous year for a grand total of 42,915 roadway fatalities. But 2020 also represented a sizable 7 percent increase over 2019, despite there being overwhelming evidence that substantially less driving was done during nationwide COVID lockdowns.

Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.), the Transportation and Infrastructure subcommittee chair holding the hearing, stated that now was the time to hold a meeting on the issue — as last year represented the single highest increase in traffic deaths since the NHTSA started keeping track in 1975.

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NADA Wants to Stop Catalytic Converter Theft

The National Automobile Dealers Association (NADA) and a dozen related trade groups are petitioning Congress to crack down on stolen catalytic converters. The emission control devices are loaded up with valuable metals and are relatively easy to steal if you’re slim enough to get beneath a parked car and happen to have a reciprocating saw handy — making them prime targets for cash strapped criminals, especially now that material prices are on the rise.

Cities across the country have reported an increase in catalytic converter theft this year. While a majority of police departments are estimating a year-over-year increase of under 40 percent, some have said their figures are substantially larger. In March, Las Vegas Police Department estimated there were 87 percent more vehicles with hacked apart exhaust pipes in 2022. Philadelphia was even higher, reporting a staggering 172 percent increase in dismantled exhaust systems.

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U.S. Government Cancels Oil and Gas Leases Amid Record Fuel Prices

Despite the United States confronting some of the highest energy prices in its history, the Biden administration has canceled oil and gas lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska’s Cook Inlet.

According to the American Automobile Association (AAA), national fuel prices are averaging out to a whopping $4.43 per gallon of regular gasoline. Diesel is much higher at $5.56 and is speculated to endure mass shortages in the coming months as reports from the Northeast have indicated there are already seeing record-low inventories. Over the past twelve months, fuel prices have risen by nearly $1.50 per gallon and most market analysts expect rates to continue moving upwards through the summer. Though they’re not all in agreement as to who should be blamed for our current predicament.

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California Tech Mogul Launches Senate Run to Destroy Tesla

Dan O’Dowd, the billionaire founder and CEO of Green Hills Software, has announced he’s running for the U.S. Senate and his campaign has a single platform — destroy Tesla Inc.

“Today I launched my campaign for U.S. Senate to make computers safe for humanity. The first danger I am tackling is @ElonMusk‘s reckless deployment of unsafe @Tesla Full Self-Driving cars on our roads,” O’Dowd tweeted on April 19th.

The tweet was accompanied by a 60-second advertisement that showed clips of various Tesla vehicles equipped with the contentious software nearly striking pedestrians and making other mistakes in traffic while a disembodied voice explains does its utmost to make you feel like Tesla is an evil company that wants its cars to kill people.

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Opinion: Someone Needs to Teach Joe Manchin How EVs Work

Senator Joe Manchin (D, West Virginia) said something this week that makes me think he needs to sit down with a guide to how electrification in vehicles works.

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Suspending Federal Fuel Tax Pitched By Senate, White House

President Joe Biden and Democratic lawmakers have suggested ending the federal gas tax until 2023 as a way to offset fuel prices that are nearing record levels and possibly appease some on-the-fence voters ahead of midterm elections. Senators Mark Kelly (D-AZ) and Maggie Hassan (D-NH) recently pitched the bill in Congress. While the White House has not made any official endorsements, it’s offered tacit support by saying it didn’t want to limit itself in terms of finding new ways of easing the financial burdens Americans are facing during a period of high inflation.

“Every tool is on the table to reduce prices,” White House assistant press secretary Emilie Simons said in regard to a possible gas tax holiday. “The president already announced an historic release of 50 million barrels from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, and all options are on the table looking ahead.”

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  • ToolGuy This is the kind of thing you get when you give people faster internet.
  • ToolGuy North America is already the greatest country on the planet, and I have learned to be careful about what I wish for in terms of making changes. I mean, if Greenland wants to buy JDM vehicles, isn't that for the Danes to decide?
  • ToolGuy Once again my home did not catch on fire and my fire extinguisher(s) stayed in the closet, unused. I guess I threw my money away on fire extinguishers.(And by fire extinguishers I mean nuclear missiles.)
  • Carson D The UAW has succeeded in organizing a US VW plant before. There's a reason they don't teach history in the schools any longer. People wouldn't make the same mistakes.
  • B-BodyBuick84 Mitsubishi Pajero Sport of course, a 7 seater, 2.4 turbo-diesel I4 BOF SUV with Super-Select 4WD, centre and rear locking diffs standard of course.