Trump Imposes 25 Percent Tariffs On All Imported Cars, Angering Seemingly Everyone

Good morning! It’s Thursday, March 27, 2025, and that is The Morning Shift: Your every day roundup of the highest automotive headlines from all over the world, multi functional place. That is where you will find an important stories which are shaping the way in which Americans drive and get around.

On this morning’s edition we’re taking a look at Trump’s latest tariffs on all imported cars, hearing about incoming Nissan CEO Ivan Espinosa’s ideas to woo Honda back, and turning an eye fixed towards the continuing Tesla protests. 

President Donald Trump loves tariffs, each as a way of waging trade wars and as a word that just has good mouthfeel. Trump has instituted, rescinded, and re-instituted numerous tariffs in the course of the early days of his second term, but Wednesday he levied a brand new one: 25 percent on all imported cars. This includes vehicles from countries with which the U.S. already has standing trade agreements, like Canada, Mexico, and South Korea, which experts say likely violaties those agreements. Legal experts be damned, though, since the tariffs are coming on April third. Reuters has some details:

Trump’s latest tariffs are based on a 2019 national security investigation into auto imports conducted during his first presidential term under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962. Trump previously used this Cold War-era trade law to impose 25% tariffs on steel and aluminum imports in 2018.

The Commerce Department found that the growing market share of imported cars was negatively impacting U.S. national security by eroding the U.S. industrial base and the power of domestic automakers to develop advanced technologies for military use.

The tariffs have upset seemingly everyone involved in the worldwide automotive market in any country, even including Trump pal Elon Musk, but there is a surprising voice of dissent: Shawn Fain, president of the United Auto Staff, who’s fully on board with the tariffs. The UAW released an announcement: 

This afternoon, the Trump administration announced major tariffs on passenger cars and trucks entering the U.S. market, marking the start of the top of a thirty-plus yr “free trade” disaster. This can be a long-overdue shift away from a harmful economic framework that has devastated the working class and driven a race to the underside across borders within the auto industry. It signals a return to policies that prioritize the employees who construct this country—fairly than the greed of ruthless corporations.

That is an unexpected move, to make sure. Fain traditionally has a superb head on his shoulders, and it’s odd to see him aligning with protectionist policy. The UAW’s stance here is smart in a vacuum, but omits the opportunity of retaliation against U.S.-built vehicles — retaliation other nations have been all too completely happy to impose. 

Nissan’s latest CEO is a product guy and a automobile guy, nevertheless it seems he’s attempting to make a reputation as a deals guy as well. Ivan Espinosa, who takes excessive job on April 1, wants one other automaker as a partner — quite possibly Honda, the corporate that Nissan backed out of negotiations with under outgoing CEO Makoto Uchida. Espinosa wants a partner to assist dig Nissan out of its rut, and Honda appears high on the list. From Bloomberg:

The auto industry’s push into intelligent cars “goes to require a number of work and a number of investment that probably will need some partner,” Ivan Espinosa, who assumes his latest role on April 1, said Wednesday. “I’m open to Honda or other partners, so long as these partners are helping us drive the vision of the business.”

A tie-up with a standard automaker could offer “some synergy” by way of size, powertrain technology and battery investment, Espinosa told reporters in Atsugi, near Nissan’s headquarters in Yokohama.

One has to wonder what those negotiations would appear to be, now that Uchida is nearly out of the image. Will Honda come back to the table with open arms, fully believing one man stood in the way in which of the deal last time, or will the parties resume negotiations from a far more tense position? 

Tesla stores have been beset by protesters in recent weeks, because apparently automaker CEOs cannot even discuss preserving a future for white children any more because of Woke. Many thought the Tesla protests would sputter and die briefly order, chalking them as much as a temper tantrum by electoral losers, however the protests are not going anywhere. In reality, they appear to only be getting more support. From Automotive News:

The nationwide movement organized by Tesla Takedown desires to suppress sales just as Tesla struggles to fulfill first-quarter delivery goals. It is a component of a worldwide backlash against Musk’s support for right-wing parties in Europe and his role as a key adviser to President Donald Trump.

The protest effort against the once-beloved automaker in electric vehicle-friendly California is ready to expand to greater than 200 Tesla locations within the U.S., Canada, Europe, the U.K. and Australia on March 29 as a part of a “global day of motion” organized by Tesla Takedown on its website.

Tesla Takedown states its calls to motion as selling Tesla cars, unloading Tesla stock, and joining the group outside Tesla stores on nearly every Saturday. This coming protest, though, guarantees to be the largest one yet. Hopefully it comes and goes without anyone deciding to drive through the crowds. 

Remember when Toyota had that massive “unintended acceleration” recall that boiled right down to floor mats? Well it seems Lucid is learning from the standard automakers, because the corporate just recalled 4,294 cars for floor mats that may “interfere” with the gas pedal. Lucid’s all-weather floor mats within the Air can shift out of position and trap the gas pedal, based on Automotive News, and will set drivers up for a crash:

If the mats on the motive force’s side of the vehicle move out of position, they may interfere with the accelerator, increasing the danger of a crash, the report said. The mats can shift because they’re secured to the ground by nibs, fairly than anchors.

The problem was noticed in August 2024 when a Lucid worker reported that the accelerator pedal had been momentarily stuck while driving.

The fix is a straightforward one: Take the all-weather mats out, and replace them with latest mats which have simpler anchors. It really goes to indicate, though, that factory all-weather mats will all the time be worse than the sort you may get within the aftermarket. This might never occur to WeatherTech. 

Every March before this? Peaceful and serene. Humans didn’t develop the capability for anger in March until 1939. 

Really, I must be linking this complete album, but I’ll get you began with the primary track off Smile! 😀 and allow you to sort it out from there. I find myself coming back to this yet another than Worlds, which is absolutely saying something.