Carmakers Seek Middle Ground in Trump Meeting on Emission Rules

Carmakers hope to convince President Donald Trump today to avoid a legal fight with California over planned rollbacks of federal emission and fuel economy rules, Bloomberg News points out.

California Gov. Jerry Brown has called the White House plan “profoundly dangerous.” The state has vowed a protracted court battle over its right to set its own emission standards.

Carmakers pushed more than a year ago for changes in the standards. Trump agreed, offering to ease regulations in return for an auto industry pledge to repatriate jobs that had moved out of the country. Now manufacturers insist they wanted to ease the timing and the system of credits for meeting tougher regulations, not a rollback of the goals themselves.

Above all, carmakers want to avoid a return to a costlier dual-standard marketplace in the U.S. Nearly 50 years ago, the U.S. Clean Air Act granted California power to establish its own emission control targets. The state and federal rules currently coincide. But California has vowed to implement the current regulatory timetable in spite of a federal rollback.

Bloomberg says manufacturers are alarmed by White House signals that it will pursue a previously rejected legal challenge to California’s right to write its own rules. The news service says the industry’s challenge today is to show support for the Trump administration without appearing to champion dirtier air and less efficient vehicles.