Welcome to the Daily 5 report for Friday, June 6. TGIF!
The unprecedented alliance between President Donald Trump and Tesla CEO Elon Musk blew up in spectacular fashion on Thursday, and the drama continued Friday. This story is inescapable, but not a surprise.
While the world's most powerful leader and the world's richest man call each other names on social media, U.S. regulators and lawmakers are rewriting decades of automotive emissions precedents, regulations and practices.
Normally a massive development for the auto industry, this story was relegated to second-tier status the last few days.
The U.S. Transportation Department declared fuel economy rules issued under then-President Joe Biden exceeded the government's legal authority by including electric vehicles in setting the rules, Reuters reported. The department made the declaration as it published a final "Resetting the Corporate Average Fuel Economy Program (CAFE)" rule, the story said.
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In Congress, Senate Republicans proposed eliminating fines for automakers who fail to meet the rules as part of a wide-ranging tax bill — a boost to the Detroit 3 and gasoline-powered vehicles, Reuters said.
The Republicans' proposal also makes emissions credits sold by Tesla less valuable, as rivals won't have to pay Tesla to comply with the rules. It could save the Detroit 3 hundreds of millions of dollars. Tesla and other EV makers have thrived on emissions credits paid by their competitors for years.
If Trump and his allies in Congress really want to go after Musk, this is the way to do it, particularly if coupled with an end to consumer tax credits for EV purchases.
Meanwhile, potentially significant trade developments are taking place between the Trump administration and China, Japan and Canada. And from Europe, Mercedes-Benz offered a compelling deal under which U.S. cars could be imported into Europe duty free in exchange for tariff waivers on the same number of vehicles that EU automakers export to the U.S., Reuters reported.
An ongoing story percolating in automotive tech circles has been the upheaval at lidar developer Luminar Technologies. CEO Austin Russell is gone, and shares have tanked about 90 percent in less than a year. Pete Bigelow's story focuses on what new CEO Paul Ricci is doing to get this once promising company back on track.
That's it for today. Have a great weekend. If you want to view this story in your browser, click here.
— Philip Nussel, online editor
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