SEMA Thanks President Trump for Killing EV Mandates
SEMA supports President Trump signing a Congressional Review Act resolution on June 12 that it said in a news release will protect more than 330,000 American jobs and preserve $100 billion in annual impact to the nation's economy. It revokes a waiver that would have enabled California to ban internal combustion engine vehicles.
SEMA said in the news release that President Trump has "provided a significant firewall for the nation's automotive aftermarket, a third of whom manufacture and sell products solely for internal combustion engine vehicles."
SEMA President and CEO Mike Spagnola said California's ban would've “shattered the nation's economy and destabilized the automotive marketplace.”
SEMA said it "is not, and never will be, anti-electric vehicles. It champions a technology-neutral approach that fosters innovation and ingenuity. The association will continue efforts to preserve Americans' rights to vehicle choice and the automotive aftermarket industry's ability to design, manufacture, and bring to market products that help solve the emissions challenge."
Beginning in 2023, SEMA led a national effort to educate voters and lawmakers on the damage of EV mandates on families, the working class, and American small businesses. In February, when the effort to overturn the California waiver kicked into high gear, SEMA mobilized an army of advocates to:
- Send more than 56,000 letters to lawmakers in the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate.
- Build a coalition of 335 small businesses for an April letter urging U.S. House and Senate leadership to hold votes to put an immediate stop to the implementation of the ACC II regulation.
- Host aftermarket business leaders and automotive influencers for 56 in-person meetings in Washington, D.C., with lawmakers and their staff.
- Fill the digital media landscape with countless memes and posts on the harm of EV mandates, which reached more than 2 million voters in key states, and running online ads that put pressure on lawmakers and staff around the Capitol.
Along the way, Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, and Vermont each backed off policies to follow California's emissions policies. North Carolina, Texas, Ohio, West Virginia and eight other states passed SEMA-supported "ban the ban" legislation to ensure such mandates never take effect again.
This follows a significant financial investment by SEMA to educate voters throughout the 2024 presidential campaign via its Driving Force Action SuperPAC, with ads running the battleground states of Wisconsin, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Michigan.
