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Car company officials have been reluctant to directly criticize 25% tariffs of President Donald Trump on imported cars and car parts, as what their business policies will do for their operations and profits.
Instead, they are following a more subtle strategy, emphasizing how much they have already invested in American manufacturing, in the hope of showing mercy.
In recent weeks in advertisements, media interviews and photo opes, the autometers are announcing their dedication to the production of cars in the United States and highlighting investments they have already done.
BMW and Ford Motor have advertised the full-page newspaper which insist on how many jobs they have created in the United States.
Hyundai officials appeared last month to announce a plan to invest $ 21 billion in the company’s US operations at the White House, allowing Trump to take credit.
Last week, at the New York International Auto Show, was a rare executive who did not mention how much his or his company had invested in American manufacturing and jobs.
John Bosela, president of the coalition for automotive innovation, said, “More than 15 automakers are not only in the US market, but also manufacture cars and trucks in the US,” “We are continue to invest here, we are continue to expand our plants here, continue to build supply chains here.”
Automkers media campaigns will reach millions of Americans, but appear to be aimed at the purpose of the audience of one on a large scale. Claiming how much he already contributes to the American economy, is a way to oppose tariffs without humiliating Trump.
Bajela said that at least some White House officials sympathize with the attitude of the industry. “There are definitely policy makers in administration who understand the complexity of the industry and the major time is required to be able to follow a new business rule,” he said.
Representatives of Bozzella and other industries say that tariffs are unrealistic to lead an investment bounce. Car manufacturers cannot quickly move factories from Mexico or Canada to the United States, they say, or overhall complex, far-flung supplier networks, especially when the business policies of Trump administration are liquid and unpredictable.
“This is a very long -term business,” Cazel Grunner, president of the US Volkswagen Group, told reporters at the auto show. “You sometimes make investment decisions for decades.” The business policy “has been so unstable,” he said. “We need stable circumstances.”
Volkswagen manufactures cars including electric ID4 in Chetanogo, Tennessee, and is building a factory in South Carolina to produce off-road vehicles using the scout brand. Audi, which is also related to Volkswagen and produces cars in Europe and Mexico, is considering manufacturing in the United States, Oliver Bloom, CEO of Volkswagen told Frankfarter Olelimine newspaper in an interview published on Friday.
BMW advertisements highlighted $ 14 billion, which the German car manufacturer invested at his factory complex in South Carolina, where it produces SUVs for the US market and for exports. The advertisements have also mentioned 120,000 jobs that BMW says it supports in the United States.
But the company denied that in recent weeks, the company had a political agenda behind the entire page advertisements in New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and USA today.
A BMW spokesperson Phil Dionney said, “Advertisements were several months and were designed to mark our milestone’s 50th anniversary in the US.” He said that the campaign was not related to the current political environment in any way, or there was a political statement. “
Ford will be more clearly political in advertisements prescribed to run in Journal, The Times, The Washington Post and several Detroit papers later this week.
“Ford Motor Company wants to take a moment to address the idea that every American car company has pulled stakes and stopped everything that is not down,” advertisements say.
Advertisements say that 80% of Ford selling vehicles in the United States have been manufactured in the US, including 100% of the company’s popular F-series trucks.
Ford CEO Jim Farley, his peers are really alone in publicly criticizing Trump’s business policies, 25% tariff on cars made in Mexico or Canada in February in February “” will blow a hole in the American industry that we’ve never seen. “
Automkers are not mentioned that most of the new investment in factories during the last five years was the result of the policies of Biden administration. In 2022, the inflation in the Congress in the Congress, the Act, provided subsidy, loan and tax credit to create a domestic electric vehicle industry and to prevent China from dominating that technology.
Hyundai said that the decision to build a $ 12.6 billion electric vehicles and battery plants in Georgia was earlier made during the Trump administration. Hyundai North America’s CEO Randy Parker said in an interview, “It was not due to IRA or Tax Credit.”
“We are investing in America, and we are not going to Canada, we’re not going to Mexico,” Parker said. “This is something that I am definitely proud of, and yes, I hope that is happening through the message.”
