President Trump just killed Joe Biden’s electric vehicle mandate, and he says it will save American families thousands of dollars on their next car.
Quick Take
- Trump approved new fuel economy standards that end Biden’s EV mandate, according to his own Truth Social announcement.
- The Transportation Department will finalize a fleetwide target of about 34.5 miles per gallon by 2031, down from roughly 50.4 mpg under Biden’s rule.
- Trump says the change cuts waste in car manufacturing and lowers prices for buyers.
- Environmental groups like the Sierra Club claim the move will raise fuel costs and pollution over time.
- The Trump administration argues Biden’s rule illegally forced EVs into the math, setting an impossible bar for automakers.
Trump Declares Biden’s EV Rule Dead
President Trump announced Saturday on Truth Social that he approved new fuel economy standards, calling them a full repeal of what he described as Biden’s “ridiculous EV Mandate.” Trump said the change would “take the waste out of building cars in America,” promising buyers lower prices and “saving families thousands on a new, beautiful, and safe car”. The Transportation Department was set to finalize the rule Monday.
The new standard sets a fleetwide average of about 34.5 miles per gallon by model year 2031. That is a steep drop from the roughly 50.4 mpg target Biden’s administration had locked in for the same year. The Biden rule pushed automakers toward heavier EV and hybrid production to hit those numbers, whether or not buyers actually wanted electric cars.
Why Conservatives Call It A Backdoor Mandate
Supporters of the rollback say Biden’s rule never should have counted EVs the way it did. The Trump administration and the auto industry argue that including electric vehicles in the fuel economy math was illegal and set a bar gas-powered cars could never meet. A Senate letter on the issue argued federal law never gave regulators the power to force EVs onto the market through the back door, and it explicitly barred agencies from counting EV fuel economy in these calculations at all.
Research from the American Energy Institute backs that view, arguing regulators at the Transportation Department and Environmental Protection Agency warped fuel economy rules into a “de-facto EV mandate” without a single vote from Congress. Heritage Foundation researchers made a similar case, warning that overly strict standards deepened America’s reliance on Chinese-made components and strained an electrical grid already at risk of blackouts.
Critics Warn Of Higher Pollution And Fuel Costs
Not everyone is cheering. The Sierra Club says the rollback will make transportation more expensive for Americans, not cheaper. The group’s Katherine Garcia argued the change would push the auto industry “backwards,” keeping polluting cars on the road longer and threatening the health of children and the elderly. Reuters reported the Transportation Department’s own estimates show the change could increase fuel consumption by about 100 billion gallons and fuel spending by $185 billion through 2050.
Those numbers stretch across 25 years and rest on government modeling, not hard proof. Even so, they are the strongest fact-based pushback in the record, and readers deserve to see them alongside Trump’s promise of savings. Everything else critics raised leans more on projection and politics than on new facts.
NYT:
The Trump administration plans to finalize Monday sharply scaled-back fuel-efficiency standards for new cars and light trucks, targeting 34.5 mpg by 2031 versus Biden’s 50.4 mpg. President Trump said Saturday he approved the rules, falsely calling Biden’s policy an EV… pic.twitter.com/1DEFhcnHvY— Anas Alhajji (@anasalhajji) September 27, 2026
What This Means For Buyers And Automakers
Automotive analysts say cutting the EV-heavy mandate could bring down the average price of the overall vehicle fleet simply because fewer expensive electric models get forced into production lineups. That tracks with what conservatives have argued for years: government should not pick winners in the auto market by mandating technology consumers did not ask for and often cannot afford.
Trump’s move restores the idea that fuel economy rules should reflect what current gas and diesel technology can realistically deliver, not a green energy wish list. Families struggling with high prices after years of inflation get a break on one of their biggest purchases. For an administration focused on cutting costs and government overreach, ending this mandate fits the bigger picture Trump promised voters.
Sources:
townhall.com, yahoo.com, thehill.com, ijr.com, nhtsa.gov
