President Trump approved new federal fuel economy standards that scrap Biden-era targets built around electric vehicles, a shift he says will cut car prices and restore auto jobs.

President Donald Trump said Saturday he has approved new federal fuel economy standards, framing the decision as a direct break with Biden-era rules that pushed automakers toward electric vehicles and higher mileage targets. In a Truth Social post, he cast the move as relief for workers and buyers who never asked for the last administration’s approach.

Newsmax reported that Trump thanked Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick for work on the standards and tied the change to broader manufacturing gains already underway.

A formal rollout was expected Monday from Duffy, according to additional coverage of the announcement.

Trump did not post the full technical tables in his Saturday message. The direction, though, matches the administration’s December proposal to reset Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards, the federal mileage rules for passenger cars and light trucks, through model year 2031.

Mileage targets drop from Biden’s 50.4 mpg path

Under that December plan, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration estimated the U.S. vehicle fleet would average about 34.5 miles per gallon by model year 2031. Biden-era standards had pointed toward roughly 50.4 mpg by the same model year.

The New York Post noted the gap and reported that the change would give automakers more room to build the gas-powered cars and trucks customers still buy, while Congress had already stripped related fines and federal EV credits and pollution limits had been wound down.

Administration estimates released with the proposal projected $109 billion in savings for Americans over five years and a nearly $1,000 cut in the average price of a new vehicle compared with the prior path. Critics disputed those cost assumptions and argued weaker fuel-economy requirements could mean higher gasoline spending for drivers over time. Both claims sit in the public record; neither has been settled by an independent scorekeeping exercise in the available reporting.

Trump described the prior regime in blunt terms on Truth Social.

He wrote that he had “just approved new Fuel Economy Standards that TERMINATE Sleepy Joe Biden and Pete Boot-EDGE-EDGE's ridiculous EV Mandate.”

"The Dumocrats cost our Great Auto Manufacturers $Billions, forced Americans into cars they never wanted, and wasted Billions on Chargers that were never built,"

the Washington Examiner reported from the same post, underscoring his charge that Democrats loaded costs onto manufacturers and spent heavily on charging infrastructure that did not materialize.

The Biden administration did not order Americans to buy electric vehicles. Its fuel-economy and tailpipe rules were built on the assumption that EVs would claim a rising share of new-vehicle sales. Trump’s team treated that design as an effective mandate that narrowed choice and raised sticker prices. That dispute is definitional: one side calls it planning for the market; the other calls it industrial policy by regulation.

Other Trump directives have likewise moved from announcement to real-world effect, including an ICE enforcement shift that set arrest records as street-level operations expanded.

Congress already zeroed the CAFE penalty

Policy scaffolding for Saturday’s announcement was already in place. In July 2025, Trump signed legislation that reduced the civil penalty for violating CAFE standards to $0. He also signed legislation blocking California’s plan to phase out sales of new gasoline-only vehicles by 2035.

Breitbart reported that the administration had already relaxed tailpipe emissions rules, repealed fines for missing mileage standards, and terminated EV purchase credits of up to $7,500, steps that cleared the path for less stringent fleetwide averages near 34.5 mpg in model year 2031.

Trump said the new standards “will take the waste out of building cars in America” and deliver “LOWER PRICES, saving families thousands on a new, beautiful, and safe car.”

Consumer preference has long favored larger vehicles. Coverage of earlier mileage fights noted that SUVs and trucks dominate showrooms, and looser yearly increases leave room for those models without the steep compliance climb built into the prior schedule.

Fox News reported on administration efforts to ease mileage rules in favor of affordable SUVs and trucks buyers actually choose, with an EPA spokeswoman saying a finalized rule would “benefit our economy,” make vehicles “more affordable,” and “save lives by increasing the safety of new vehicles.”

Voters tracking executive follow-through have seen the same pattern in other lanes, from a Supreme Court ruling restoring Trump’s SAVE system for state voter-citizenship checks to steady pressure on institutions that slow enforcement.

Automakers announce U.S. plant money

Trump tied the standards to a manufacturing rebound he says is already visible. “Every Manufacturer, from General Motors to Ford to Stellantis, has called me wanting to build here, and now they can,” he posted.

Company announcements line up with that claim even if executives cite a mix of tariffs, demand, and federal policy shifts rather than any single rule. General Motors has outlined billions in U.S. manufacturing investment while shifting some production away from Mexico and China. Ford has announced billions for projects in Michigan and Kentucky. Stellantis has described a $13 billion U.S. investment plan it says will expand domestic production by 50%.

Just the News highlighted Trump’s argument that the standards reduce waste in domestic assembly and encourage those builders to keep work here, with plants and jobs pointed toward Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, South Carolina, and other states.

Trump said that under his administration “over 100 $Billion is being invested in American Autos, and that's just the beginning,” adding that plants and jobs are returning across the industrial map.

White House officials credit tariffs, regulatory relief, and related economic measures for the production tilt. Automakers, for their part, describe a blend of trade pressure, shopper demand, and the retreat from EV-centered federal rules. The investment totals are public; the exact weight of each cause is not settled in a single ledger.

Enforcement and regulatory follow-through have defined other fronts as well, including a drive that has pushed illegal immigrants out of U.S. banking channels as agencies apply existing law.

Choice returns to the lot

For years, federal mileage and emissions architecture assumed electrification would carry an ever-larger share of compliance. That design raised the cost of staying in gasoline models and treated consumer hesitation as a problem to be regulated away. Charging build-outs lagged the rhetoric. Penalties and state phase-out plans added another layer of pressure on legacy product lines.

Saturday’s approval, stacked on the July penalty law and the California legislation, reverses that stack. Automakers regain room to sell what buyers budget for. Families see a path to lower sticker prices if the administration’s cost models hold. Workers in Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky, and South Carolina get a clearer signal that federal rules will not punish domestic gasoline and hybrid production by default.

Open questions remain. The full final-rule text, docket tables, and legal effective dates were not attached to the Truth Social post. Independent fuel-cost tallies that fully test the $109 billion and roughly $1,000 vehicle-price projections against higher pump spending have not been locked in the reporting at hand. Causal shares behind each automaker dollar, tariffs versus demand versus CAFE relief, still depend on company-by-company detail.

Presidential follow-through stories draw the same audiences who read White House signaling pieces, including coverage of a military band performance at a Trump-Xi dinner that carried its own message about American resolve.

What is not in doubt is the policy turn itself. Biden-era targets aimed the fleet at 50.4 mpg and an EV-heavy compliance path. Trump’s approved standards point toward 34.5 mpg by 2031, zeroed fines, blocked state phase-outs, and a public claim that lower prices and returning plants are the point.

When Washington stops punishing the cars Americans already drive, factories and paychecks have a chance to follow the customers, not the other way around.