Gas War: Ford Urges Other Automakers to Join the Californian Coalition

The Ford Motor Company is asking automakers to join it in supporting Californian vehicle emissions targets aimed at supplanting the rollback that was supposed to become the national standard. General Motors has already abandoned its support of the Trump rollbacks, which offered concessions to appease environmental groups but ultimately targeted more lax fueling regulation while seeking to eliminate California’s ability to self regulate as a way to curb its influence. But industry leaders are under the impression that a President Biden would attempt to swiftly transmission back to Obama-era regulatory targets or simply adopt the California model that’s been at odds with the national standards established by the Trump administration.

Considering how aggressive the Biden-Harris energy/environmentalism platform is, it certainly seems a plausible scenario and certain automotive executives feel that it would be best to go into 2021 aligned and supportive. The matter is even scheduled to be brought forward during Tuesday’s virtual auto trade association meeting.

This presumes that the election won’t be overturned and everything goes as predicted by the mainstream media. That means a President-elect Biden with electors going largely unswayed by the evidence presented by concerned citizens, poll watchers, statistical analysts, and Trump’s legal team over the next two weeks. But, according to Reuters, Ford has already prognosticated a Biden administration and has seen the writing on the wall based on the people he’s selecting for his team, vocal commitment to rejoining the Paris Climate Accord, praise of Cash for Clunkers, and previous statements made about the need to end fracking — and likely the United States’ short-lived energy independence.

From Reuters:

In a previously unreported letter, Ford Americas President Kumar Galhotra on Wednesday said with Biden’s win, the fight over Trump’s effort to preempt California on vehicle emissions “is now, at least for the next set of years, essentially moot. The more relevant issue is thus the question of the standards.”

Galhotra urged automakers “to actively consider embracing the California framework.”

He added: “The Biden Administration will not let the Trump standards stand, and either by way of litigation and/or a regulatory reboot, the new team will move in a different, more stringent direction.”

Plenty of Biden’s platforms mimic California’s regulatory norms — especially in regard to issues like the economy, gun control, energy, and transportation. So it’s not unreasonable to assume his administration might pursue fueling targets that closely match those desired by the Golden State. But we’ve discussed this ad nauseam and won’t bore you with anything more than a few links back to the relevant articles.

The important thing to remember is that Democrat leadership in the executive branch will undoubtedly pursue much stricter emission standards and Ford is asking everyone to get on board ahead of time. It joined with BMW, Honda, and Volkswagen Group in July of 2019 in a voluntary agreement to adhere to Californian emission limits rather than whatever the (then undecided) national standard would be through 2026. Other automakers stayed silent or backed the Trump administration in embracing less stringent standards that provided them greater flexibility in the types of automobiles they could manufacture and sell.

Last month, California Air Resources Board Chair Mary Nichols had also said the state’s emissions agreement with automakers could serve as a “good template” for federal standards. Reuters noted that Ford recently suggested the same, adding that Tom Carper of Delaware — the top Democrat on the Environment and Public Works Committee — said “the rest of the automakers should end their challenges to state authority and embrace the California framework as the first step in setting standards that get us to where we need to be.”

As of now, we’ve not been informed which part of Los Angeles they’ll be relocating the United States Capitol. But we’ll keep you posted as it continues becoming the nexus of decision making in America.

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