A group of Republican attorneys general filed a challenge to the Biden administration’s latest fuel efficiency standards, which they say will “drive gas-powered cars off the road.”
Kentucky Attorney General Russell Coleman and West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey led the effort by 26 states to stop the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s “unworkable” new rule in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit.
The rule mandates that car manufacturers drastically increase the average fuel economy of passenger cars and light trucks in under a decade.
The U.S. Department of Transportation’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration today issued new vehicle fuel economy standards that will save Americans more than $23 billion in fuel costs while reducing pollution. This rule is in accordance with continuous energy security efforts that date back to the 1970s, when the average vehicle got about 13 miles to the gallon.
In this final rule, fuel economy will increase 2% per year for model years 2027-2031 for passenger cars, while light trucks will increase 2% per year for model years 2029-2031. These increases will bring the average light-duty vehicle fuel economy up to approximately 50.4 miles per gallon by model year 2031, saving passenger car and light truck owners more than $600 in fuel over the lifetime of their vehicles
Heavy-duty pickup truck and van fuel efficiency will increase 10% per year for model years 2030-2032 and 8% per year for model years 2033-2035. This will result in a fleetwide average of approximately 35 miles per gallon by model year 2035, saving heavy-duty pickup and van owners more than $700 in fuel over the lifetime of their vehicles. (NHTSA)
“The forced transition to EVs would bypass the free market while increasing costs on families and undermining the reliability of the electric grid,” the pair said.
“President Biden has spent billions and mobilized the entire federal government to push EVs, and Americans still aren’t buying it. Even if they wanted an EV, fewer and fewer families could afford one because of historic inflation,” Coleman said. “Kentuckians want the Biden Administration to focus on the crisis at the border, violent crime and the surge of deadly drugs instead of picking its favorites in the auto industry.”
According to the statement, less than 1 percent of registered vehicles in Kentucky are EVs.
"Congress did not give the NHTSA such power to reshape an industry that would ultimately affect the pocketbooks of consumers — this rule is legally flawed and unrealistic," Morrisey said. "This will undoubtedly cause the United States to be dependent on other nations like China for our energy needs and will undermine American energy security by increasing demand and strain power grids."
Coleman and Morrisey are joined by Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Virginia and Wyoming.