Trump celebrated the change Saturday in a lengthy Truth Social announcement.
“BIG DAY FOR AMERICAN AUTO WORKERS AND CAR BUYERS! I have just approved new Fuel Economy Standards that TERMINATE Sleepy Joe Biden and Pete Boot-EDGE-EDGE’s ridiculous EV Mandate,” Trump posted.
“The Dumocrats cost our Great Auto Manufacturers $Billions, forced Americans into cars they never wanted, and wasted Billions on Chargers that were never built,” Trump wrote.
The president argued that his replacement standards will give manufacturers considerably more freedom over what kinds of vehicles they produce while ultimately reducing the price consumers pay at dealerships.
“These new Standards will take the waste out of building cars in America. That means LOWER PRICES, saving families thousands on a new, beautiful, and safe car.”
Trump also took another shot at the vehicles produced under the previous regulatory framework, saying future automobiles would be “far better than the Environmental Monsters that we were building heretofore.”
The move has been building for some time.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy ordered a review of the Biden-era CAFE program after Trump returned to office, with the Transportation Department arguing that federal regulators had improperly used fuel-economy requirements to accelerate vehicle electrification. The administration subsequently unveiled its “Freedom Means Affordable Cars” initiative in December 2025.
That proposal estimated that changing the standards could reduce the average price of a new vehicle by approximately $1,000 and produce $109 billion in savings over five years. Those figures are administration estimates and depend on assumptions about vehicle prices, fuel consumption and manufacturer compliance costs.
Trump, meanwhile, tied Saturday’s announcement directly to his broader push to bring automobile production back to the United States.
“Every Manufacturer, from General Motors to Ford to Stellantis, has called me wanting to build here, and now they can!” he said.
“Under my Administration, over 100 $Billion is being invested in American Autos, and that’s just the beginning. The Plants are coming back, and Jobs are returning, to Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, South Carolina, and all over our Country,” he continued.
The president thanked Duffy and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick for helping advance the policy.
“Thank you to our Great Secretaries of Transportation and Commerce, Sean Duffy and Howard Lutnick. AMERICA IS BACK. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!!!”
The political fight over vehicle regulations has become part of a much larger disagreement over how quickly Washington should encourage the transition from gasoline-powered vehicles to EVs.
Biden officials viewed stricter efficiency and emissions standards as a way to reduce fuel consumption and greenhouse-gas emissions while encouraging development of cleaner vehicles. Trump has instead emphasized affordability, domestic manufacturing and allowing consumers to choose among gasoline, hybrid and electric vehicles.
Trump has previously attacked the Biden policy as costly and unrealistic.
Trump said Biden’s goal “was ridiculous, very expensive.”
“It put tremendous upward pressure on car prices, combined with the insane electric vehicle mandate. Biden’s burdensome regulations have caused the price of cars to soar more than 25 percent, and in one case, they went up 18 percent in one year,” Trump commented last year.
“The greatest scam in American history, the Green New Scam. And it’s a quest to end the gasoline-powered car. This is what they wanted to do, even though we have more gasoline than any other country by far,” he said.
“And people want the gasoline car. They want everything. They want electric. They want to have lots of alternatives. But they do want the gasoline car. Right now, it’s leading away by a lot,” Trump added.
The administration’s approach represents a dramatic change in federal automobile policy: rather than using increasingly stringent efficiency standards to accelerate electrification, Trump’s Transportation Department says its goal is to lower compliance costs and leave more decisions about vehicle technology to manufacturers and consumers.
The full significance of Saturday’s announcement should become clearer when the Transportation Department publishes the final details. Reporting Sunday indicated the administration plans to release the finalized rule Monday, September 28.
Whatever those final numbers show, Trump is making the philosophical divide unmistakable. Biden sought to accelerate America’s transition toward electric vehicles through tougher federal standards. Trump is moving Washington in the opposite direction, betting that fewer regulatory constraints will translate into cheaper vehicles, more domestic production and greater choice on dealership lots.
