US auto dealers urge the president to reconsider rapid EV transition plans

Dealers across the United States are requesting that the President slow down the move towards transport decarbonization. The Environmental Protection Agency wants to see 60 percent of vehicles sold in the US be electric by 2030.

"We can't sell the two or three [electric cars] currently in the showroom. How are we expected to cope when they are to constitute 80 percent of our sales?" asks Mary Rice from a Toyota dealership in Greensboro, North Carolina, in an interview with Autonews. She highlights that customers have comfortably transitioned to hybrids over time. "In this showroom, the oldest Prius hybrid is seven days old. In contrast, the oldest bZ4X electric car is 266 days old,” Rice adds.

Given these circumstances, it's hardly surprising that 4,000 dealerships across the United States have reached out to President Biden to slow down the latest decarbonization proposals from the Environmental Agency. By 2030, it proposed that 60 percent of new cars should be electric, and that this should increase to 67 percent by 2032.

Dealers agree that the appeal of electric vehicles is likely to increase over time. Yet they identify a problematic charging network, affordability, and the cars’ range as primary obstacles.

"The entire issue has become overly politicized", says Mickey Anderson, managing director of Baxter Auto Group, which owns 20 dealerships in Nebraska, Kansas, and Colorado. Anderson was the author of the letter to the President, which garnered signatures from the industry. "This is not about being in a red or blue state. It's not about being pro-electric or pro-internal combustion engine. This letter is entirely for the sake of the American consumer," he asserts.