Voters disapprove of Biden administration’s electric vehicle initiative

A new Free Press poll released Friday found that when it comes to convincing consumers to buy electric vehicles, a majority of Michigan voters would prefer the government stay out of the business.

Former Republican President Donald Trump and Republicans have largely taken advantage of what they called the “electric vehicle mandate” of Democratic President Joe Biden (and by extension Democratic nominee and Vice President Kamala Harris), which they claim will force automakers to build and consumers to buy. electric cars.

As the Free Press reports, there is no EV mandate, but the Biden administration has imposed tough emissions standards that, barring new technology or rule changes (which has happened at least once in the last three administrations), automakers will need about two-thirds of new cars they sell every year to have zero emissions (hence electric cars) by 2032, otherwise they could face huge fines.

However, these standards are part of the Biden administration’s effort to address transportation sources as a major source of greenhouse gas emissions that cause climate change, which also includes incentives for consumers to buy electric vehicles and government funding for new factories, technologies and charging stations automakers, including Detroit, not only welcomed it, they asked for it.

A new poll conducted for the Free Press and its media partners by Lansing-based EPIC-MRA finds a clear majority, 55%, disapprove of the government’s “plan to promote the sale of more electric vehicles,” with 45% strongly disapproving. By comparison, only 39% approve of such a move and 6% are undecided.

Deepening the issue in Michigan also appears to have helped Trump. Among those who disapprove of the promotion of electric vehicles, 72% say they are voting for Trump, compared with 20% of that group who say they are voting for Harris. (Harris, on the other hand, does much better with those who favor promoting electric vehicle sales, receiving 85% of their support versus Trump’s 10%.)

This is also was an issue in the race for Michigan’s open U.S. Senate seatbut former Republican U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers saw a lower level of support from those who disapprove, 66%, compared to Trump, while Democratic U.S. Rep. Elissa Slotkin received the same level of support , 20%, from those who disapprove, as does Harris. did. (Slotkin’s level of support from those who favored the initiative was virtually identical to that of Harris.)

And while Democrats generally support the move (70% approve, 23% disapprove), self-described independents disapprove by 62% to 28%. Republicans disapprove by an even wider margin: 83% to 12%.

By the way, in no region of Michigan did a majority of respondents say they approved of the government’s promotion of electric vehicles. In metro Detroit, disapproval was 51-44%, and in the outer suburbs, including Ann Arbor, as well as some more conservative counties, disapproval was 49-44%. In western Michigan, where discontent was highest, it was 65% against and 30% in favor.

For the survey, EPIC-MRA surveyed 600 randomly selected voters from last Thursday through this Monday. The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.

Both Harris and Slotkin have repeatedly said they don’t believe consumers should be told what kind of car to buy, but that the U.S. must take steps to ensure EV technology and production ramp up or domestic automakers could lose out to China. which is far ahead in the production of electric vehicles. Trump and Rogers argue that the push to sell electric vehicles will only lead to losses of American cars and more Chinese imports, although one of Trump’s biggest supporters is Elon Musk, who runs electric car maker Tesla.

Contact Todd Spangler: [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter@tsspangler.