More than a month before his inauguration, Donald Trump is continuing his feud with California, this time over the future of the auto sector.
The Biden administration granted California’s proposal for stricter-than-federal vehicle emission regulations, requiring automakers to sell more electric vehicles before effectively prohibiting the sale of new gas-powered automobiles in 2035.
That legislation is at the heart of California’s climate agenda and, given the state’s size and share of the national automobile market, has the potential to transform the trajectory of the American auto industry. It’s also a big target for Trump, congressional Republicans, and industry groups, who have stated unequivocally that they are unwilling to give power to California and are willing to fight in court to determine the fate of electrification.
“Everybody’s gearing up for a showdown on zero-emission vehicles,” said Bill Magavern, policy director for the environmental group Coalition for Clean Air.
Biden’s move provides California additional legal cover to continue its aggressive embrace of battery technology. It accomplishes this by complicating Trump’s intention to restrict the state’s ability to set its own emissions limits under the Clean Air Act.
If the Environmental Protection Agency had not approved the request before Trump took office, his administration might have blocked it right away. Instead, it will have to go through a lengthy administrative procedure to rescind the waiver, which may take years and will likely end in court.
California is already planning for that possibility. Gov. Gavin Newsom convened a special legislative session earlier this month to increase money for the state attorney general’s office, preparing for a spate of legal battles over immigration, health care, and other policy areas where the state has clashed with Trump.
The first political dispute on the agenda is over electric vehicle policy.
Newsom used the statement to criticize Trump, with whom he has disagreed on climate, federal disaster spending, immigration policy, and other issues.
“Naysayers like President-elect Trump would prefer to side with the oil industry over consumers and American automakers, but California will continue fostering new innovations in the market,” the governor said in a statement Wednesday.
A Trump official stated Wednesday that the president-elect has “a mandate to implement the promises he made on the campaign trail, including stopping attacks on gas-powered cars.”
“When he takes office, President Trump will support the auto industry, allowing space for both gas-powered cars and electric vehicles,” said Karoline Leavitt, Trump’s incoming White House press secretary.
The disagreement stems from Trump’s prior presidency, when his agency was the first to repeal California’s tailpipe pollution limits for passenger automobiles in 2019. That move prompted a lawsuit from California and environmental groups, but no court ruling was reached before Biden’s EPA revived the Advanced Clean Cars regulation in 2022.
The Trump administration is not alone in the brawl.
Both the oil and automobile sectors intend to oppose the waiver approval. They’re concerned about the impact not only on the California market, but also on the 11 other states that have enacted an updated clean vehicle rule known as ACC II.
“These policies will harm consumers — millions of whom do not even live in California — by removing their ability to purchase new gas cars in their home states and increasing vehicle and transportation costs,” said Chet Thompson, CEO of the American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers Association, in a statement.
EVs account for almost one-fourth of new car sales in California, but the share can be as low as 10% in New York and other states that follow the legislation, according to a memo from the Alliance for Automotive Innovation dated December 11.
The car industry trade organization said Wednesday that it expects the waiver to be accepted and subsequently removed by Trump next year. The paper argues that most states lack the charging infrastructure to comply with California’s electric car mandate, and that customers are not ready to make the changeover at the projected pace.
“We anticipate that President Trump will revoke the waiver in 2025,” said John Bozzella, the group’s president and CEO. “We’ve said the country should have a single, national standard to reduce carbon in transportation, but the question about the general authority of California to establish a vehicle emissions program — and for other states to follow that program — is ultimately something for policymakers and the courts to sort out.”
Some states are waiting until 2027 to start complying, but it will still be difficult, particularly in economically challenged places where EVs are out of reach for many people. In New Mexico, where the poverty rate is almost 50% greater than the national average, EV sales account for approximately 5% of the car market.
While California has the unusual ability to set its own emissions regulations for automobiles, trucks, and other vehicles, the state lacks broad authority to chart its own route.
The waiver system began in 1970, when Congress adopted the Clean Air Act as the nation’s primary pollution control program. California, which had already adopted its own pollution restrictions in the 1960s and had the country’s worst air quality at the time, was granted a special exception.
While California has made strides in removing the heavy smog that previously shrouded cities like Los Angeles, the state’s sprawling transportation sector and valley geography, which traps pollutants, have put it well outside of compliance with federal air quality regulations.
California air officials claim that locations such as Southern California, which has a population of roughly 24 million people, cannot meet federal standards unless emissions from vehicles, trucks, trains, and ships are dramatically reduced. Staying out of compliance may allow the EPA to withdraw essential federal roadway money, as the Trump administration threatened to do in 2019.
“On the one hand, we’re going to keep you from complying, and on the other hand, we’re going to penalize you for not complying,” Magavern of the Coalition for Clean Air stated. “There is a certain vindictiveness that Trump has expressed towards California leadership, and that vindictiveness may be more important than any subsequent facts.”