Trump approves sharply lower fuel-economy standards, scrapping Biden-era EV push

President Trump said Saturday that he has approved a sweeping rollback of federal vehicle fuel-economy standards, scrapping the Biden administration's push toward electric vehicles in favor of a far more lenient mileage schedule for gasoline-powered cars and trucks. The Transportation Department is expected to publish the completed rule on Monday, according to Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, formally replacing a regulation that has shaped what Americans can buy at dealerships for more than two decades.

The change means automakers will face fleet-wide fuel-efficiency targets that rise only 0.25 percent to 0.5 percent a year through 2031, according to the proposed rule the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration published in December, down from annual increases that reached 8 percent and 10 percent under the schedule finalized in 2024. Mr. Trump cast the move as a win for car buyers and factory workers, declaring on Truth Social that the standards would "TERMINATE" what he called "Sleepy Joe Biden and Pete Boot-EDGE-EDGE's ridiculous EV Mandate."

The numbers

Under the rule being replaced, automakers were required to hit a fleet-wide average of 50.4 miles per gallon by model year 2031. The new standard, first detailed in the December proposal and expected to be finalized largely intact, cuts that target to 34.5 miles per gallon, according to the Transportation Department's own estimates, first reported by Reuters. The department projects the change will lower the average cost of building a new vehicle by about $930, which it says will translate into lower sticker prices.

The trade-off, by the department's own accounting, runs the other way at the pump. Reuters reported that the agency's estimates show the weaker standards will lead Americans to burn roughly 100 billion additional gallons of gasoline through 2050, raise total fuel spending by about $185 billion and increase carbon dioxide emissions from vehicles by roughly 5 percent over that period.

• New 2031 fleet-wide target: 34.5 mpg, down from 50.4 mpg
• Estimated vehicle cost reduction: about $930 per vehicle
• Projected added fuel spending through 2050: about $185 billion
• Projected added gasoline consumption through 2050: about 100 billion gallons

How we got here

The Biden administration finalized the stricter Corporate Average Fuel Economy, or CAFE, standards in June 2024, explicitly designed to push automakers toward hybrid and electric models by making it increasingly difficult to meet targets with gasoline-only fleets. The rule became an early target of the Trump administration, which directed NHTSA to revisit it within months of taking office; the agency published a notice in June 2025 announcing its intent to reset the program "to realign it with congressional intent." A formal proposal followed in December, alongside a White House fact sheet promoting the reset that put projected consumer savings at $109 billion over five years. NHTSA then took public comment and held hearings before moving toward the final rule now expected this week.

The administration has paired the rollback with a broader pitch to the auto industry. In his Saturday post, Mr. Trump credited the change with drawing new investment commitments from Detroit automakers and said plants and jobs were "returning to Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, South Carolina, and all over our Country."

Who is affected

The rule touches nearly every part of the auto sector. Automakers gain more flexibility to keep building larger, gasoline-powered SUVs and trucks without the compliance costs, credits and penalties tied to the stricter targets, potentially easing pressure on production lines that had been retooling for electrified models. Oil refiners and gasoline retailers benefit from sustained, and by the department's own projection, growing fuel demand. Buyers face a direct trade-off: lower upfront vehicle prices against higher fuel costs over a vehicle's lifetime, a calculation that will land hardest on households that drive long distances or already feel squeezed by gasoline prices. Autoworkers in states Mr. Trump named, including Michigan, Ohio, Indiana and South Carolina, are being told the change protects their jobs, while advocates for electric-vehicle manufacturing and battery suppliers face a weaker federal push behind the technology they build.

Reaction

Administration officials framed Saturday's announcement as a jobs and affordability win. "A major victory for America's auto workers is coming Monday," Mr. Duffy wrote in a social media post previewing the final rule. Critics focused on the household costs the department's own estimates project.

"Lowering standards will accelerate what [Trump] has already been doing: handing the clean tech future to China and forcing Americans to pay more at the pump," said Pete Buttigieg, who led the Transportation Department under President Biden.

Environmental advocates raised similar concerns about pump prices. Atid Kimelman, an attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council told Newsweek that "oil companies will get a windfall from gutting the fuel economy standards, but the rest of us are going to be handing over" more money at the pump, arguing the timing was especially painful with gasoline already above $4 a gallon in much of the country.

What happens next

The Transportation Department is expected to publish the finalized standards as soon as Monday, which would start the clock on the rule taking legal effect and on any court challenges. Rollbacks of vehicle-efficiency rules have drawn litigation from Democratic-led states and environmental groups in the past, and lawyers on both sides are expected to scrutinize whether NHTSA adequately justified reversing course from the 2024 rule. The Environmental Protection Agency, which sets a related set of vehicle greenhouse-gas standards alongside NHTSA's mileage rule, has not yet finalized its own parallel rollback, meaning automakers could still face a second, separate regulatory shift in the months ahead. The change also lands amid a midterm campaign in which gasoline prices and household costs are already central issues, guaranteeing the trade-off between cheaper vehicles and pricier fill-ups will remain politically contested well past this week's rule.