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Report: Trump’s Auto Investment Revival Claim Is Short by $46 Billion
President Donald Trump praises Fiat Chrysler Automobiles and Mazda-Toyota for making the auto industry’s first major investments in the U.S. in several years. Not so, says the Center for Automotive Research in Ann Arbor, Mich.
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In his State of the Union speech last night, President Donald Trump praised Fiat Chrysler Automobiles and Mazda-Toyota for making the auto industry’s first major investments in the U.S. in several years.
Not so, says the Center for Automotive Research in Ann Arbor, Mich.
CAR calculates carmakers announced some $46 billion in U.S. factory investments over the previous eight years of the Obama administration, Bloomberg News reports. Those earlier programs include new factories opened by Kia in Georgia and Toyota in Mississippi. Volvo Car Group also broke ground in 2015 on a factory in South Carolina that is expected to begin operations by the end of this year.
In the past few years, several carmakers also have announced multi-billion-dollar capacity expansions and upgrades for their U.S. operations, the research institute adds.
The two plants Trump cited are worth roughly $3 billion. They involve a factory in Alabama that will begin making cars for Toyota and SUVs for Mazda in 2021, and FCA’s decision to move heavy-duty RAM pickup truck production from Mexico to Michigan in 2020.
Trump cited those two projects because they involve moving capacity—and jobs—back to the U.S. from existing or previously planned facilities in Mexico.