On Saturday, President Trump announced that he had approved new vehicle fuel economy standards, and on Monday the Transportation Department made the final rule official. Within hours, the legacy media covered the rollback of Biden’s vehicle mandates with shrill criticisms. The New York Times told readers that the administration was gutting a signature federal effort to speed the shift to electric vehicles. Politico judged the revision “one more nail in the coffin“ for Biden-era EV policy. Bloomberg’s headline announced that the US “guts“ auto mileage rules, while the Washington Post ran its own story under the banner “Analysts are doubtful“, reporting that “experts” scoffed at the administration’s claim of a $1,300 cut in new-car prices.
The final rule requires a fleetwide average of 34.9 miles per gallon by model year 2031, in place of the roughly 50 mpg demanded by Biden’s standards. To the assembled commentariat, this is climate vandalism, a betrayal of drivers and a gift to Beijing. Every one of these claims is false or badly misleading. And the missing context – what the Biden mandates cost, who paid, and what they actually bought – is the story the legacy press coverage never reveals.
A funeral for a rule already dead
Start with an irony that the NYT buries in its own reporting. The paper conceded that Congress had already scrapped the fines for automakers that miss the mileage targets, leaving Monday’s rollback more symbolic than substantive. That penalty repeal, part of last year’s One Big Beautiful Bill, is what mattered. Politico’s own expert, Joshua Linn of the University of Maryland, explained that without penalties CAFE (corporate average fuel economy) had become little more than a polite request: Detroit is asked nicely to add technology, with no consequence for declining. Neither outlet drew the obvious conclusion. If the standards were toothless, the handwringing over their formal retirement is theatre. If they still bit, they were a mandate – precisely what the Times insists Trump falsely accuses Biden of imposing. The coverage wants it both ways.
As for the Post’s doubtful analysts, Stephanie Brinley of Mobility Global and Jessica Caldwell of Edmunds argue that savings will not reach buyers when the average new vehicle already costs around $50,000, and that any saving would first be absorbed by tariffs. In fact, NHTSA itself cautions that its estimated $1,289 reduction in average vehicle cost by model year 2031 materialises only if manufacturers pass it on. But whether a cost saving shows up at the dealership is irrelevant to what the vehicle efficiency mandates cost in the first place, and who paid.
