#Mercedes-BenzUSA

Mercedes Benz will pay a $13 million penalty to U.S. safety regulators over a failure to report a string of necessary recalls. A signed settlement on file with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) indicates that Daimler’s American arm could be on the hook for up to $20 million in regulatory fines.

The remaining $7 million is in the hands of the NHTSA, which has to eventually decide whether or not Mercedes expedited its recall notices or improved upon its recall processes. The automaker will be audited by the regulatory agency until 2022 to help make those assessments.

Mercedes-Benz is investing $1 billion into its Tuscaloosa, Alabama, assembly operations in order to facilitate the production of its first EQ-branded SUVs in 2020. The investment, timed to roughly coincide with the beginning of Mercedes-Benz ML production in Alabama, is expected to result in the hiring of another 600 employees.

In the near term, Mercedes-Benz has been open with its doubts regarding the profitability of pure electric vehicles. Evidently, the long-term view is different. And it probably doesn’t hurt to pour more money into a U.S. operations hub that accounts for nearly half the vehicles sold by the automaker in America.

We first mentioned this Monday evening, and now it’s official: Mercedes-Benz USA is leaving New Jersey for the old, sweet song of Atlanta.