Hong Kong — China will ban hidden door handles on cars, commonly used on Tesla’s electric vehicles and many other EV models, starting next year.
All car doors must include a mechanical release function for handles, except for the tailgate, according to details released by China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.
Officials said the policy aims to address safety concerns after fatal EV accidents in which electronic doors reportedly failed to operate and trapped passengers inside vehicles.
A woman opens the door for a Tesla Model YL electric vehicle at a showroom in Beijing on Feb. 3, 2026. China will ban hidden door handles on cars sold in the country starting next year, phasing out the minimalist design popularized by Tesla over safety concerns.
Pedro Pardo / AFP via Getty Images
The new requirement for both internal and external door handles will take effect on Jan. 1, 2027. For car models that were already approved, carmakers will have until Jan. 1, 2029, to make design changes to match the regulations.
Vehicles including Tesla’s Model Y and Model 3, BMW’s iX3 and other models by many Chinese brands feature retractable car door handles that could be subject to the new rules.
Chris Liu, a Shanghai-based senior analyst at technology research and advisory group Omdia, said the global impact of China’s new rules could be substantial and other jurisdictions may follow suit on retractable door handles. Carmakers will be facing potentially costly redesigns or retrofits.
“China is the first major automotive market to explicitly ban electrical pop-out and press-to-release hidden door handles,” he said. “While other regions have flagged safety concerns, China is the first to formalize this into a national safety standard.”
It’s likely that regulators in Europe and elsewhere will reference or align with China’s approach, Liu said. The new requirements would impact premium EVs more as retractable door handles “are treated as a design and aerodynamic statement,” he added.
A draft of the proposed rules was published by China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology in September for public comment.
NAIROBI, Kenya — Kenya plans to roll out new tax incentives to speed up adoption of electric vehicles, betting that lower costs for vehicle parts and charging stations will attract investors and accelerate a shift away from fossil fuels.
Transport Cabinet Secretary Davis Chirchir said the measures are part of a newly launched National Electric Mobility Policy, which now aligns the transport sector with Kenya’s climate commitments.
“Electric mobility is crucial to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, decreasing reliance on imported fossil fuels, and fostering economic growth through local manufacturing and job creation,” Chirchir said.
Kenya has in recent years introduced targeted incentives, including a zero value added tax on electric buses, bicycles, motorcycles and lithium-ion batteries, and lower excise duties on selected EVs. The new incentives include exemptions for value-added taxes and excise duties beginning in July. The stamp tax for charging stations will be reduced in 2027.
The government has a target for 3,000 EVs for its ministries by the end of next year.
Kenya has committed to cutting its greenhouse gas emissions by 32% by 2030 under the Paris Agreement treaty on climate change, with electric mobility identified as vital since transport is a major contributor to carbon emissions.
The market is growing quickly, with the number of registered EVs rising to 24,754 in 2025 from 796 in 2022, largely driven by increased use of electric motorcycles, buses and fleet vehicles in urban areas.
Sales of electric vehicles, including motorcycles, buses and private cars, are forecast to match those of gas and diesel-fueled vehicles by 2042, marking a structural shift in Kenya’s transport system.
“We have now laid the foundation for a cleaner, more efficient, and more sustainable transport system that fully aligns with our climate commitments,” said Mohammed Daghar, principal secretary for transport. “With transport a major contributor to emissions, accelerating electric mobility is essential to achieving our target.”
Electric mobility policies in most African countries are still evolving, with interest growing in use of electrics for public and private transport. Rwanda and Egypt have introduced a mix of fiscal and non-fiscal incentives to encourage use of EVs. Companies involved in EV manufacturing and assembly also benefit from corporate income tax relief and tax holidays.
Still, for many countries the focus is on electric buses and two-wheelers. Policies include tax exemptions on EV imports and investments in charging infrastructure, and pilot projects for electric public transport.
The transition carries risks. Kenya relies heavily on fuel taxes to fund road maintenance and other transport-related services. The policy estimates that as electrics displace gas and diesel engines, there will be a $693 million shortfall in fuel tax collections by 2043, up from a $16.9 million gap in 2025.
Chirchir said the government is studying alternatives, including road-use charges and possible electricity-based levies linked to charging stations to offset the decline.
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TOKYO — Japan said Monday it has successfully drilled and retrieved deep-sea sediment containing rare earth minerals from the seabed near a remote island, as the country seeks to reduce its reliance on China.
The deep-sea drilling vessel Chikyu’s successful gathered the sediment at a depth of nearly 6,000 kilometers near the island of Minamitorishima, Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi said in a statement on X.
The test retrieval of the rare earths from that depth is a world first, she added.
“It is a first step toward industrialization of domestically produced rare earth in Japan,” Takaichi said. “We will make effort toward achieving resilient supply chains for rare earths and other critical minerals to avoid overdependence on a particular country.”
China controls most of the global production of heavy rare earths, which are used for making powerful, heat-resistant magnets in industries such as defense and electric vehicles.
Japan has faced growing tensions with China since Takaichi’s comment in November about a possible Japanese involvement in the case of Chinese military action against Taiwan, the self-governing island that Beijing claims as its own.
China recently suspended exports to Japan of dual-use goods with potential military use, raising concern in Japan that rare earths may be included.
While 17 elements are classified as rare earth, the U.S. government has identified 50 minerals overall that are labeled critical minerals, which also include a number of other minerals that are seen as essential to the economic and military strength of the nation.
Japanese researchers discovered deposits rich with critical minerals around Minamitorishima in the 2010s, including those containing high-concentration rare earths that could last hundreds of years.
Under the Strategic Innovation Promotion Program, Japan has been working on research, development and feasibility studies of rare earths deposits around the island.
“The successful retrieval of the sediment containing rare earth elements is a meaningful achievement from the perspectives of economic security and comprehensive ocean development,” Japan’s Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Masanao Ozaki said Monday.
He said that moving toward industrialization of rare earths mud mining will require demonstrating the full process from mining through separation and refining, as well as verifying its economic viability, based on the results of the ongoing tests.
Details, including the amount of rare earth contained, still need to be analyzed, officials said.
The Chikyu, which means Earth, departed last month for Minamitorishima, about 1,950 kilometers (1,210 miles) southeast of Tokyo, and arrived at the mining site on Jan. 17. The first batch of rare earth sediment was retrieved on Feb. 1, according to Japan’s Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology, which is conducting the survey.
Japan’s Self Defense Forces last year said Chinese naval vessels had been spotted near Minamitorishima.
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AP video journalist Mayuko Ono in Tokyo contributed to this report.
NEW YORK — Tesla’s annual profit plunged to its lowest level since the pandemic five years ago as it ceded the title of the world’s biggest electric vehicle maker to a Chinese rival and boycotts hammered sales.
The EV company run by Elon Musk reported Wednesday that net income last year dropped 46% to $3.8 billion. It was the second year in a row with a steep drop in profit. The decline came despite the introduction of cheaper models and Musk’s promise to remain laser-focused on the company after a foray into U.S politics.
Still, Tesla investors have kept the faith in Musk. The stock is up 9% in the past year.
Musk has been urging investors to focus less on car sales and more on what he considers a bright new future of robotaxis ferrying millions around in cars without drivers, or even steering wheels, and robots watering plants and taking care of elderly parents. Investors and analysts expect to hear more from Musk on those plans in a conference call later Wednesday.
For the fourth quarter of last year, Tesla’s net income dropped 61% to $840 million, or 24 cents. Excluding one-time charges, net income totaled 50 cents per share, compared to analysts forecast of 45 cents.
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Saturday threatened to impose a 100% tariff on goods imported from Canada if America’s northern neighbor went ahead with its trade deal with China.
Trump said in a social media post that if Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney “thinks he is going to make Canada a ‘Drop Off Port’ for China to send goods and products into the United States, he is sorely mistaken.”
While Trump has waged a trade war over the past year, Canada this month negotiated a deal to lower tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles in return for lower import taxes on Canadian farm products.
Trump initially had said that agreement was what Carney “should be doing and it’s a good thing for him to sign a trade deal.”
Carney’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Trump’s threat came amid an escalating war of words with Carney as the Republican president’s push to acquire Greenland strained the NATO alliance. Trump had commented while in Davos, Switzerland, this week that “Canada lives because of the United States.” Carney shot back that his nation can be an example that the world does not have to bend toward autocratic tendencies.
Trump later revoked his invitation to Carney to join the president’s “Board of Peace” that he is forming to try to resolve global conflicts.
Trump’s push to acquire Greenland has come after he has repeatedly needled Canada over its sovereignty and suggested it also be absorbed the United States as a 51st state.
He resumed that this week, posting an altered image on social media showing a map of the United States that included Canada, Venezuela, Greenland and Cuba as part of its territory.
In his message Saturday, Trump continued his provocations by calling Canada’s leader “Governor Carney.” Trump had used the same nickname for Carney’s predecessor, Justin Trudeau, and his use of it toward Carney was the latest mark of their soured relationship.
Carney has not yet reached a deal with Trump to reduce some of the tariffs that he has imposed on key sectors of the Canadian economy. But Canada has been protected by the heaviest impact of Trump’s tariffs by the Canada-U.S.-Mexico Agreement. That trade agreement is up for a review this year.
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Associated Press writer Rob Gillies in Toronto contributed to this report.
Sales of Tesla’s electric Cybertruck fell 48% in 2025, new data shows.
Tesla sold 20,237 Cybertrucks in 2025, down from 38,965 the previous year, according to figures from Kelley Blue Book’s annual electric vehicle (EV) salesreports.
Other Tesla models also struggled to entice buyers, with sales of the automaker’s X, S and Y vehicles all falling year-over-year. Tesla’s Model 3 was the only vehicle in its lineup to see stronger demand, with sales rising to 192,440, up 1.3% from 2024, according to Kelley Blue Book.
Tesla cited “uncertainty from shifting trade, tariff and fiscal policy” as some of the headwinds it was facing in a presentation last year. The company remains the dominant seller of electric vehicles in the U.S., accounting for around 46% in 2025.
“It’s been an uphill battle for sales, but a long demand curve ahead,” said tech analyst Dan Ives of Wedbush Securities.
Tesla did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
In January, the company said it delivered 1.64 million vehicles in 2025, down 9% from 1.79 million in 2024. Tesla has been eclipsed by China’s BYD as the world’s biggest EV maker.
Tesla isn’t the only EV maker to see weaker sales. Across the auto industry, electric vehicle sales last year totaled roughly 1.3 million, a 2% drop from 2024.
One obstacle is affordability, given that electric cars remain generally pricier than gas-powered vehicles. As of November, the average price of a new EV was $58,638, versus less than $50,000 for conventional cars, according to Cox Automotive.
The tax and spending bill passed by Congress last year also eliminated tax credits for both new and used EVs, which critics warned could make the cars unaffordable for many people.
Multiple recalls
Tesla launched the futuristic-looking steel Cybertruck in 2023 at a starting price of $60,990. At the time, Tesla CEO Elon Musk touted them as the strongest pickup truck on the road, able to tow 11,000 pounds.
However, the trucks have faced a rash of mechanical and other problems. Last year, Tesla recalled 46,000 Cybertrucks over an issue with the trim panel, which the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said could detach from the vehicle and pose a risk to other drivers.
Cybertrucks also became a flashpoint in the debate over Musk’s role in the Trump administration as the head of the Department of Government Efficiency. In a sign of protest, some people vandalized Cybertrucks at Tesla dealerships.
Catalysts for growth
Despite such challenges, Tesla’s stock price has performed well, rising rougly 9% to $450.39 over the last 12 months. Ives expects the carmaker’s strength in self-driving technology and so-called robotaxis to drive growth.
Some Wall Street analysts also have high hopes for a humanoid robot, dubbed Optimus, that Tesla is developing and expects to roll out commercially over the next year. Speaking at the annual World Economic Forum event in Davos, Switzerland, Musk said Thursday that Optimus robots are currently performing “simple tasks” at Tesla plants.
“By the end of this year, I think they will be doing more complex tasks, and probably by the end of next year, I think we’d be selling humanoid robots to the public,” he said.
The market for humanoid robotics is today valued at between $2 billion and $3 billion, according to Barclays analysts. But the investment bank expects the sector to expand to at least $40 billion by 2035, and perhaps by as much as $200 billion, as AI-powered robots enter labor-intensive sectors, such as manufacturing.
With temperatures plunging in some states as a massive winter storm bears down across the U.S., some electric vehicle owners could face a cold, hard truth: EVs can lose efficiency in low temperatures, curtailing their driving ranges.
The issue drew widespread attention in January 2024, when some Chicago-area Tesla owners found their EVs’ batteries had died in subzero temperatures. Other EV owners have posted online about their vehicles’ shorter ranges in winter.
Cold weather can slow an EV battery’s chemical and physical reactions, reducing vehicle power. And unlike conventional cars with an internal combustion engine, an EV can’t tap its motor’s heat to warm the interior. Instead, EVs must tap their batteries to provide cabin heat, which can sap their range, according to Consumer Reports.
At 16 degrees Fahrenheit, EVs lose about 25% of their range when driving at about 70 mph, versus their range when driving at the same speed in mid-60-degree temperatures, Consumer Reports found in road testing.
EV owners could be tested this weekend as extreme cold temperatures spread across the U.S., along with freezing rain, snow and rain. Thermometers in the Minneapolis area plunged to 21 degrees below zero on Friday morning, with wind chills making it feel even colder.
Temperatures through the weekend are expected to sink to record lows across parts of the Southern Plains and Mid-Atlantic states.
Are newer EVs better at handling the cold?
Car manufacturers have made some changes that mean newer EVs perform better in cold temperatures, according to the Zero Emission Transportation Association, or ZETA, an industry trade group.
Newer EVs have heat pumps and better battery encasements that can help improve battery efficiency, ZETA noted. South Korean automaker Kia says that its new EV models include advanced heat pumps, which extract heat from the outside air, even in cold weather, and transfer it to the cabin, leaving the EV with more energy available for driving.
Other EVs with heat pumps include the Acura ZDX and Volvo EX40, according to a list published by electric-vehicle research firm Recurrent.
How do EV owners in cold-weather places cope?
Subzero weather isn’t a deterrent for drivers in countries with cold climates — that includes Norway, where EVs accounted for 96% of all new car sales last year.
Drivers in cold regions have learned how to minimize the impact of frigid weather on their EVs by following these tips:
Precondition thebattery. This means turning on the EV’s heat while it’s plugged in to warm the cabin and the battery before hitting the road, which helps because the vehicle uses energy from the charger, rather than the battery.
Park indoors or in a covered space. Providing shelter from the elements can help reduce the impact of cold weather, according to Volkswagen.
Minimize demands on the battery. VW advises EV owners to conserve energy by using the auto climate function to manage the cabin’s temperature. Another tip is to keep things comfortable by using a vehicle’s heated seats or steering wheel, instead of cranking up the heater via the climate system.
Breaking with the United States, Canada has agreed to cut its 100% tariff on Chinese electric cars in return for lower tariffs on Canadian farm products, Prime Minister Mark Carney said Friday.
Carney made the announcement after two days of meetings with Chinese leaders. He said there would be an initial annual cap of 49,000 vehicles on Chinese EV exports to Canada, growing to about 70,000 over five years. China will reduce its total tariff on canola seeds, a major Canadian export, from 84% to about 15%, he told reporters.
Carney said China has become a more predictable partner to deal with than the U.S., the country’s neighbor and longtime ally.
“Our relationship has progressed in recent months with China. It is more predictable and you see results coming from that,” Carney said.
Carney hasn’t been able to reach a deal with President Trump to reduce some tariffs that are punishing some key sectors of the Canadian economy and Mr. Trump has previously talked about making Canada the 51st state.
The prime minister, speaking outside against the backdrop of a traditional pavilion and a frozen pond at a Beijing park, said meetings in China have been historic and productive.
Earlier Friday, he and Chinese leader Xi Jinping pledged to improve relations between their two nations after years of acrimony.
Xi told Carney in a meeting at the Great Hall of the People that he is willing to continue working to improve ties, noting that talks have been underway on restoring and restarting cooperation since the two held an initial meeting in October on the sidelines of a regional economic conference in South Korea.
“It can be said that our meeting last year opened a new chapter in turning China-Canada relations toward improvement,” China’s top leader said.
Chinese President Xi Jinping meets with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, Jan. 16, 2026.
Xie Huanchi/Xinhua via Getty Images
Carney looks to improve global governance
Carney, the first Canadian prime minister to visit China in eight years, told Xi that better relations would help improve a global governance system that he described as “under great strain.”
Later, he said at the news conference that the system may give way at least in part to country-to-country or regional agreements rather than the global ones that have underpinned economic growth in the post-World War II era.
“The question is: What gets built in that place? How much of a patchwork is it?” he said.
The new reality reflects in large part the so-called America-first approach of Mr. Trump. The tariffs he has imposed have hit both the Canadian and Chinese economies. Carney, who has met with several leading Chinese companies in Beijing, said ahead of his trip that his government is focused on building an economy less reliant on the U.S. at what he called “a time of global trade disruption.”
A Canadian business owner in China called Carney’s visit game-changing, saying it re-establishes dialogue, respect and a framework between the two nations.
“These three things we didn’t have,” said Jacob Cooke, the CEO of WPIC Marketing + Technologies, which helps exporters navigate the Chinese market. “The parties were not talking for years.”
Canada had been aligned with U.S. on tariffs
Canada had followed the U.S. in putting tariffs of 100% on EVs from China and 25% on steel and aluminum under former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Carney’s predecessor.
China responded by imposing duties of 100% on Canadian canola oil and meal and 25% on pork and seafood. It added a 75.8% tariff on canola seeds last August. Collectively, the import taxes effectively closed the Chinese market to Canadian canola, an industry group has said. Overall, China’s imports from Canada fell 10.4% last year to $41.7 billion, according to Chinese trade data.
Carney tried to address the concerns of Canadian automakers and autoworkers by saying the initial cap on Chinese EV imports was about 3% of the 1.8 million vehicles sold in Canada annually and that, in exchange, China is expected to begin investing in the Canadian auto industry within three years.
More than half of the Chinese EVs exported to Canada would have an import price of less than 35,000 Canadian dollars ($25,000) within five years, he said, making them accessible to consumers.
“We’re building (a) new part of our car industry, building cars of the future in partnership, bringing affordable autos for Canadians at a time when affordability is top of mind, and doing it at a scale that allows for a smooth transition in the sector,” he said.
“For the exchange of a small piece of the Canadian market, we have a commitment. We are waiting for an investment commitment in Canada. The real leaders of the new industry. So it’s an agreement that will create the future for our industry.”
China sees an opening under Trump
China is hoping Mr. Trump’s pressure tactics on allies such as Canada will drive them to pursue a foreign policy that is less aligned with the United States.
Carney, though, noted Canada’s relationship with the U.S. is much more multifaceted, deeper and broader. Canada and China have different systems and disagree on issues such as human rights, he said, limiting the scope of their engagement even as they seek ways to cooperate on areas of common interest.
The Canadian leader leaves China on Saturday and visits Qatar on Sunday before attending the annual gathering of the World Economic Forum in Switzerland next week. He will meet business leaders and investors in Qatar to promote trade and investment, his office said.
Three of the EV fast-charging stations will be soon available at shopping centers in Elmont, Levittown and Commack. The companies just launched their first fast-charging station at the Glen Oaks Shopping Center in Queens and will soon open another in Whitestone.
The new stations, each with eight dual-port Kempower Satellite chargerswith NACS/CCS1 connectors, are coming soon to the Home Depot Shopping Center at 1760 Hempstead Turnpike in Elmont; the Commack Shopping Center at 50 Veterans Memorial Highway in Commack; and the Nassau Mall shopping center at 3601 Hempstead Turnpike in Levittown. All of the properties are owned by the Feil Organization.
The dual-port Kempower Satellite EV chargers are coming to more Long Island shopping centers. / Courtesy of Get Charged Fast EV Charging
The fast-charging stations feature free Wi-Fi, a few payment options, and don’t require new apps or memberships to access, according to a company statement. Get Charged rates start at $0.42 per kilowatt-hour, and ride share drivers, the high-volume, frequent flyers of EV charging, get juiced at a discounted rate.
“Get Charged is committed to providing fast, safe, and dependable charging infrastructure,” said Marc Horowitz, Get Charged Fast EV Charging co-managing partner. “Kempower is the ideal partner for supplying innovative, world-class charging hardware to meet the fast-charging needs of the region and the industry.”
At each location, Get Charged Fast leases eight existing parking spots and an additional 400 square feet to house its chargers and associated equipment. Besides the rent, the property owners also get a small percentage of the charging revenue, andthe EV chargers allow retail landlords to provide an additional amenity to their shoppers.
“Over the last five or six years, I’ve been approached many times by lots of different EV chargers, and we just kind of felt that the industry had matured enough at this point where we could make an intelligent decision for the benefit of the customers of our shopping centers, providing an amenity that wouldn’t necessarily be obsolete in a few years,” said Randall Briskin, vice president of retail leasing for Feil Organization. “And so we finally elected to take most of our shopping centers and allocate a few parking spaces for these EV chargers.”
Horowitz said his firm is actively seeking other malls and shopping centers as prospective charging station sites on Long Island.
“We offer the amenity to our landlords at zero cost to them and help them to draw in new shoppers, supporting the flow of traffic to their tenant businesses,” Horowitz told LIBN. “We take responsibility for everything needed, including design and engineering, construction, permitting and insuring, working with PSEG, maintenance, ownership and operation of the entire site. We install our own independent electric meter and use only top-of-the-line U.S. manufactured DC fast chargers.”
While the lack of EV chargers has exacerbated “range anxiety,” a top concern for people considering purchasing electric vehicles, the number of charging stations has steadily increased. Nassau and Suffolk counties currently have 1,561 EV charging ports: 579 DCFC ports and 982 Level 2 ports, an overall increase of more than 500 ports from 2024. Those stations serve an ever-increasing number of vehicles, as there are now 87,304 EVs registered on Long Island, according to Drive Electric Long Island.
“Drive Electric Long Island is very happy to hear of the expanding charging infrastructure on Long Island that will help support and complement charging on corridors here on Long Island,” Ronald Gulmi, chair of Drive Electric Long Island’s EV Infrastructure & Fleet Committee, told LIBN. “The new charging stations will complement charging done at workplaces, multi-unit dwellings and residences, helping to expand the range of electric vehicle travel.”
Based in Finland, Kempower has its U.S. headquarters in Durham, N.C. Listed on the Nasdaq Helsinki Stock Exchange, the company manufactures modular and scalable EV charging systems that are now in 66 countries.
“Globally, EV drivers increasingly prefer charging spots with access to a variety of services like the Get Charged retail-centered charging hubs,” Kempower North America President Monil Malhotra said in the statement. “We’re pleased to work with Get Charged to provide accessible and convenient solutions for EV drivers across New York.”
Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer offered a contrasting view of manufacturing in Detroit Thursday, two days after President Donald Trump defended his tariff strategy in the Motor City.
Whitmer, a term-limited Democrat who is in her last year as governor, said in a speech at the Detroit Auto Show that the administration’s tariff strategy has hurt American auto manufacturing and is benefiting Chinese competitors. It’s a message she has repeated over the past year as economic uncertainty has rippled across the automobile sector.
“This will only get worse without a serious shift in national policy,” Whitmer said.
Her remarks followed Trump’s speech defending his economic policy Tuesday in Detroit, a major hub of automobile manufacturing. He also toured the factory floor of a Ford plant in Dearborn.
“All U.S. automakers are doing great,” Trump said.
Whitmer offered a differing picture of the impact, saying that American manufacturing has contracted for months leading to job loss and production cuts. She has remained firmly opposed to Trump’s tariff strategy since last year, especially as her state partners closely with Canadian business. Automobile parts often cross the U.S.-Canadian border several times in the assembly process.
“America stands more alone than she has in decades,” Whitmer said. “And perhaps no industry has seen more change and been more impacted than our auto industry.”
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Whitmer’s speech.
Whitmer has kept a more cordial relationship with Trump in his second term compared to his first. The relationship included a few White House visits last year. Long considered a possible Democratic candidate for president, Whitmer’s strategy is notably different than other potential 2028 names who have take more public, combative approaches to Trump, including California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker.
In her address, her first of the year, Whitmer said every time she has met with Trump this past year, she has told him that hurting the U.S.-Canadian relationship only helps Chinese competition.
Trump changed his tune when it comes to automobiles in the last year. He originally announced a 25% tariff on automobiles and parts only to later relax the policy as domestic manufactures sought relief from the threat of rising production costs.
On his tour in the Detroit area, Trump suggested the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, a major trade agreement he negotiated in his first term, was irrelevant, although he provided few other details The UMCA is up for review this year.
Whitmer defended the trade agreement in her speech.
“When we fight our neighbors, however, China wins,” she said.
WASHINGTON — A bipartisan group of lawmakers have proposed creating a new agency with $2.5 billion to spur production of rare earths and the other critical minerals, while the Trump administration has already taken aggressive actions to break China’s grip on the market for these materials that are crucial to high-tech products, including cellphones, electric vehicles, jet fighters and missiles.
It’s too early to tell how the bill, if passed, could align with the White House’s policy, but whatever the approach, the U.S. is in a crunch to drastically reduce its reliance on China, after Beijing used its dominance of the critical minerals market to gain leverage in the trade war with Washington. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping agreed to a one-year truce in October, by which Beijing would continue to export critical minerals while the U.S. would ease its export controls of U.S. technology on China.
The Pentagon has shelled out nearly $5 billion over the past year to help ensure its access to the materials after the trade war laid bare just how beholden the U.S. is to China, which processes more than 90% of the world’s critical minerals. To break Beijing’s chokehold, the U.S. government is taking equity stakes in a handful of critical mineral companies and in some cases guaranteeing the price of some commodities using an approach that seems more likely to come out of China’s playbook instead of a Republican administration.
The bill that Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., and Sen. Todd Young, R-Ind., introduced Thursday would favor a more market-based approach by setting up the independent body charged with building a stockpile of critical minerals and related products, stabilizing prices, and encouraging domestic and allied production to help ensure stable supply not only for the military but also the broader economy and manufacturers.
Shaheen called the legislation “a historic investment” to make the U.S. economy more resilient against China’s dominance that she said has left the U.S. vulnerable to economic coercion. Young said creating the new reserve is “a much-needed, aggressive step to protect our national and economic security.”
When Trump imposed widespread tariffs last spring, Beijing fought back not only with tit-for-tat tariffs but severe restrictions on the export of critical minerals, forcing Washington to back down and eventually agree to the truce when the leaders met in South Korea.
On Monday, in his speech at SpaceX, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth revealed that the Pentagon has in the past five months alone “deployed over $4.5 billion in capital commitments” to close six critical minerals deals that will “help free the United States from market manipulation.”
One of the deals involves a $150 million of preferred equity by the Pentagon in Atlantic Alumina Co. to save the country’s last alumina refinery and build its first large-scale gallium production facility in Louisiana.
Last year, the Pentagon announced it would buy $400 million of preferred stock in MP Materials, which owns the country’s only operational rare earths mine at Mountain Pass, California, and entered into a $1.4-billion joint partnership with ReElement Technologies Corp. to build up a domestic supply chain for rare earth magnets.
The drastic move by the U.S. government to take equity stakes has prompted some analysts to observe that Washington is pivoting to some form of state capitalism to compete with Beijing.
“Despite the dangers of political interference, the strategic logic is compelling,” wrote Elly Rostoum, a senior fellow at the Washington-based research institute Center for European Policy Analysis. She suggested that the new model could be “a prudent way for the U.S. to ensure strategic autonomy and industrial sovereignty.”
But companies across the industry are welcoming the intervention from Trump’s administration.
“He is playing three-dimensional chess on critical minerals like no previous president has done. It’s about time too, given the military and strategic vulnerability we face by having to import so many of these fundamental building blocks of technology and national defense,” NioCorp’s Chief Communications Officer Jim Sims said. That company is trying to finish raising the money it needs to build a mine in southeast Nebraska.
On Monday, finance ministers from the G7 nations huddled in Washington over their vulnerability in the critical mineral supply chains.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who has led several rounds of trade negotiations with Beijing, urged attendees to increase their supply chain resiliency and thanked them for their willingness to work together “toward decisive action and lasting solutions,” according to a Treasury statement.
The bill introduced on Thursday by Shaheen and Young would encourage production with both domestic and allied producers.
Congress in the past several years has pushed for legislation to protect the U.S. military and civilian industry from Beijing’s chokehold. The issue became a pressing concern every time China turned to its proven tactics of either restricting the supply or turned to dumping extra critical minerals on the market to depress prices and drive any potential competitors out of business.
The Biden administration sought to increase demand for critical minerals domestically by pushing for more electric vehicle and windmill production. But the Trump administration largely eliminated the incentives for those products and instead chose to focus on increasing critical minerals production directly.
Most of those past efforts were on a much more limited scale than what the government has done in the past year, and they were largely abandoned after China relented and eased access to critical minerals.
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Funk reported from Omaha, Nebraska. AP writer Konstantin Toropin contributed to the report.
As General Motors settles into its new Detroit headquarters, the automotive industry is facing challenging times as it contends with rising costs, shifting tariff policies and a fledgling electric vehicle market. GM CEO Mary Barra tells CBS News that, despite those challenges, “I think we’re on a good path” and she is optimistic about the future of her company and the U.S. economy.
The market for electric vehicles hasn’t quite taken off in the U.S. just yet. Barra told “CBS Evening News” anchor Tony Dokoupil Tuesday that GM is “still committed” to EVs, but thinks a major issue is that the industry was “getting a little ahead of the consumer.”
“A vehicle is such a big purchase for a consumer,” she said. “For many of them, it’s the most expensive thing that they buy.”
“I think we’re on a good path. I think as there’s more charging infrastructure, as we continue to get the cost of batteries down, I think consumers will pick an electric vehicle, because they’re better,” Barra predicted.
Asked why the U.S. seems to be unable to compete with China in terms of making affordable electric vehicles, Barra said, “I believe at GM we are.”
She said U.S. safety standards and other regulatory requirements are higher than they are in China and that China’s auto industry is “heavily subsidized.”
“I think we can compete and have a better vehicle, and I think we’re doing that,” she said.
But the cost of a new vehicle has continued to rise in recent years, and the Trump administration’s aggressive tariff policy has also added to that, Barra said.
“It had a few-billion-dollar impact last year,” she said of those tariffs. But, she noted, it led to GM making changes, including bringing more production to the U.S., and praised the administration for making “the playing field…a bit more level” for U.S. manufacturers.
“We worked with the administration and they took the time to understand our industry to make sure there wasn’t unintended consequences so that we could still compete with some of the vehicles coming from other countries,” Barra said. “I think it was a shift that we’re working through to get back. But I think ’26 will be an even better year than ’25, and I think the playing field is a bit more level than it was just, you know, 18 months ago.”
But consumer sentiment in the U.S. remains pessimistic, polling has shown, and the auto industry is often seen as a bellwether for the larger economy. Barra, however, said of a shaky year for GM and the economy, “we really aren’t seeing it.
“We think the market’s gonna be about the same as it was last year,” she told CBS News.
Barra touted the “tremendous number of vehicles” that GM makes in the U.S., and when asked what it truly means for something to be “American-made” — considering many of the parts are often sourced from overseas — she said “it starts with where the vehicle is designed. Where all the engineering is done.”
Barra also said more than half of GM’s vehicles are assembled in the U.S. and that a majority of the components are sourced from America. She also said GM is continuing its efforts to fill job positions in the U.S.
“One of the things we do is we work with the military, and as people are ending their service to our country, putting them in a training program so they can then work in our dealerships,” Barra said. She also said GM has a “very robust apprenticeship program” for its factory workers.
Asked about concerns workers may have about automation, Barry said GM has been using robotic assistance to help build its vehicles for decades.
“We focus on jobs that are either repetitive and maybe have ergonomic issues, so people get hurt doing them, so we focus on safety and we focus on ergonomics,” Barra said. “We also focus on, there’s certain jobs that people don’t want to do. We focus on that, and we look at how do we make each of our team members more efficient.”
She also noted there are some instances in which “the precision of the job requires automation.”
The charges that will be recorded in the fourth quarter follow an announcement in October that the Detroit automaker would take a $1.6 billion charge for the same reason in the previous quarter, with automakers forced to reconsider ambitious plans to convert their fleets to electric power.
The EV tax credit ended in September. The clean vehicle tax credit was worth $7,500 for new EVs and up to $4,000 for used ones.
GM, which had been the most ambitious among all U.S. automakers with plans to replace internal combustion engines, said in its filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission late Thursday that the $6 billion in charges includes non-cash impairments and other non-cash charges of about $1.8 billion as well as supplier commercial settlements, contract cancellation fees, and other charges of approximately $4.2 billion.
EVs have been considered to be the future of the US automotive industry. GM announced in 2020 that it was going to invest $27 billion in electric and autonomous vehicles over the next five years, a 35% increase over plans made before the pandemic.
GM expected more than half of its factories in North America and China would be capable of making electric vehicles by 2030. It also pledged at the time to increase its investment in EV charging networks by nearly $750 million through 2025.
Its goal was to make the vast majority of the vehicles electric by 2035, and the entire company carbon neutral five years after that.
Those plans have be shaken due to the drastic differences in economic and environmental policies between the Biden and Trump administrations.
China has become a global leader in electric vehicle technology in recent years, with factories there churning out millions of cars and laying the groundwork for a massive charging network for vehicles.
Earlier this month, Tesla was dethroned as the world’s largest EV automaker, replaced by China’s BYD, which produced 2.26 million electric vehicles last year.
At the Minneapolis Convention Center, it’s horns honking, engines revving and car gurus gathering under one big roof.
The Twin Cities Auto Show began on Saturday. This year, it’s running earlier than normal.
“I like the old stuff, you know, the older vehicles. I love ’em,” said Mickey Strickler of Minneapolis.
The show welcomes everyone under the sun to “lookie-loo” or wander in with a purpose. Chris Leeman of Zimmerman is getting a look at possible future rides for his wife.
“We came here just to get kind of an all-around fit and feel of what she might like in the next year or two,” Leeman said. “The Toyota cars right now ain’t quite to the standard that I think I want my wife to be in.”
There’s more than 325 vehicles inside the convention center. Nobody is able to sell or haggle on the showroom floor.
“The show reflects the car business in a lot of ways,” said Scott Lambert, president of the Twin Cities Auto Show. “Electric vehicles are in a big reset right now.”
WCCO spoke to some attendees who gave their opinions of the automotive industry’s current state.
“I think it sucks,” Strickler said. “It’s not like it used to be. It’s hard to find good vehicles now.”
“I like the Mazda 90 because of the inline-six engine,” said Laun Aiken of Sauk Rapids. “I’m old school. I grew up driving inline-six vehicles, and so for them to reintroduce it into their line is kind of interesting.”
The show runs now through Jan. 11. Tickets can be purchased online. First responders get in for free.
A late-night stop at a gas station in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota, could have turned dangerous — but quick thinking and teamwork helped prevent the worst.
The fire happened at Winner Gas Station on Humboldt Avenue North on Dec. 30, 2025. Brooklyn Center police officers quickly pushed the car from the gas pumps, preventing a potentially explosive situation.
“Fires are going to go up,” said Brooklyn Center Fire Chief Todd Berg. “By the quick-thinking officer, by pushing the car out from underneath the canopy, saves further damage to maybe the gas station or the building itself.”
The move created distance, and time, until fire crews arrived to find smoke coming from underneath the vehicle, where the battery is located.
“In an EV fire, you have to sort of attack it or extinguish it differently than a gasoline vehicle,” Berg said. “A battery pack is usually packed underneath on an EV vehicle, so there’s special tools we use.”
Firefighters deployed two new tools: a special fire blanket and a “Turtle.”
“The fire blanket is a specialized piece of equipment. We’ll put it up over the vehicle so that it’s not allowing any additional oxygen in,” Berg said.
Berg said the “Turtle” is like a big sprinkler.
“Two people can pick it up and slide it under the vehicle,” he said. “It cools down the battery packs. It puts out around 500 gallons of water a minute.”
Berg says a typical car fire takes around 10 to 15 minutes to extinguish and requires around 500 gallons of water total. But the gas station operation took 2.5 hours and nearly 30,000 gallons of water.
“If you recognize smoke or heat or, you know, something’s not right, pull over, check things out, and if you notice a fire dial 911,” Berg said.
NEW YORK — Tesla lost its crown as the world’s bestselling electric vehicle maker on Friday as a customer revolt over Elon Musk’s right-wing politics and stiff overseas competition pushed sales down for a second year in a row.
Tesla said that it delivered 1.64 million vehicles in 2025, down 9% from a year earlier.
Chinese rival BYD, which sold 2.26 vehicles last year, is now the biggest EV maker.
For the fourth quarter, sales totaled 418,227, falling short of the 440,000 that analysts polled by FactSet expected. The sales total may likely have been impacted by the expiration of a $7,500 tax credit that was phased out by the Trump administration at the end of September.
Even with multiple issues buffeting the company, the stock finished 2025 with a gain of approximately 11%, as investors hope Tesla CEO Musk can deliver on his ambitions to make Tesla a leader in robotaxi service and get consumers to embrace humanoid robots that can perform basic tasks in homes and offices.
Shares of Tesla rose almost 2% before the opening bell Friday.
NEW YORK (AP) — Tesla lost its crown as the world’s bestselling electric vehicle maker on Friday as a customer revolt over Elon Musk’s right-wing politics and stiff overseas competition pushed sales down for a second year in a row.
Tesla said that it delivered 1.64 million vehicles in 2025, down 9% from a year earlier.
Chinese rival BYD, which sold 2.26 vehicles last year, is now the biggest EV maker.
For the fourth quarter, sales totaled 418,227, falling short of the 440,000 that analysts polled by FactSet expected. The sales total may likely have been impacted by the expiration of a $7,500 tax credit that was phased out by the Trump administration at the end of September.
Even with multiple issues buffeting the company, the stock finished 2025 with a gain of approximately 11%, as investors hope Tesla CEO Musk can deliver on his ambitions to make Tesla a leader in robotaxi service and get consumers to embrace humanoid robots that can perform basic tasks in homes and offices.
Shares of Tesla rose almost 2% before the opening bell Friday.
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BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) — The Colombian city of Cartagena began replacing its iconic horse buggies with electric carriages Tuesday, following years of protests by animal rights activists, who argued that horses pulling 19th-century-like coaches for tourists suffered from exploitation and poor health.
In a sunny plaza lined with elegant colonial era mansions, Mayor Domek Turbay introduced a new fleet of 30 vehicles with large wheels and open tops that resemble the city’s traditional horse carriages. The new vehicles are powered by batteries and have steering wheels for their drivers, instead of reins and yokes.
“Times are changing,” Turbay said. “For many years locals and visitors alike had rejected the mistreatment that comes with using horses to pull buggies for tourists.”
Cartagena is one of Colombia’s most popular destinations, thanks to its location on the Caribbean Sea, and its well preserved historical center, where visitors can still walk along stone walls built in the 17th century to defend the city from attacks by pirates and buccaneers.
Since the 1940s, tourists have also been able to get around the city’s lantern lit streets on small buggies pulled by horses, whose clip-clopping sound became a quintessential part of the city’s life.
But over the past decade, animal rights activists have been lobbying the municipal government to axe the tradition.
Fanny Pachon, a local activist, said that while horses are pack animals, they are not meant to work in a city with cement roads, cars and motorbikes. She pointed out that on several occasions horses have collapsed on the city’s streets due to Cartagena’s heat.
“Their joints suffer from the pavement,” she said. “And the honking of cars can stress them out.”
The Colombian city, whose historic center is a UNESCO World Heritage site, is now billing itself as the first major tourist destination to replace horse buggies with electric vehicles.
The city government said that over the next few weeks, 62 electric carriages, which were custom built in China, will be introduced in the city center. The city is also building a warehouse with a small solar plant and a charging station for the new sight-seeing vehicles.
The move has been fiercely opposed by the city’s traditional horse buggy owners, who argue that their industry has already been regulated to improve animal welfare.
Coach rides were restricted mostly to night-time hours by regulations published in 2015, that also said that horses had to undergo inspection by the local animal welfare agency.
“We are one of the most regulated industries in this city,” said Jacqueline Gonzalez, the owner of two traditional coaches in Cartagena.
Coach owners have threatened to go on a hunger strike if the city does not compensate them for their losses. They argue that the city government is pushing them out of a business that working class families built up with decades of hard labor.
“This has not been a transition,” said Yesid Soto, the president of an association that represents horse coach owners and their employees. “It has been more of an imposition.”
A decree issued last week by Turbay prohibited the use of horse carriages starting Monday. It states that the electric buggies that will now take tourists around the city center, will be the property of the city.
Soto said there are 26 horse coach owners in the city who will be displaced by the new decree.
He said that coach owners are asking the city to compensate them for the horse carriages that will be taken off the city’s streets, but that so far, an agreement with officials has not been reached. Soto said that during the city’s high season for tourism, in December and January, a horse buggy can earn around $150 each day.
Cartagena’s municipal government says it wants to hire coach owners and coach drivers to operate the new vehicles. It has offered jobs to horse carriage drivers, but has still not spelled out how it could integrate coach owners into the management of the new fleet of electric vehicles.
Turbay has accused the coach owners of “sabotaging” negotiations.
A recent Facebook post from a Mustang Mach-E owner in Canada triggered a wide-ranging conversation on social media and beyond, as EV enthusiasts and skeptics debated how modern electric crossovers manage grip and control in icy conditions.
The original post detailed an unsettling moment on a steep, ice-coated driveway where the owner, despite driving “super slowly” and on winter tires, nearly slid into her own home. She reported using the Mach-E’s most conservative traction settings, including Whisper driving mode and disabling one-pedal driving, yet traction loss still nearly led to a collision. This incident brings to the surface the fact that even advanced traction systems can be outmatched by extreme surface conditions.
At its core, a winter traction challenge like this is about the interaction of three critical elements: tire grip, vehicle dynamics control systems, and driver input strategies. Electric vehicles such as the Mustang Mach-E bring unique traits to this mix, especially compared with traditional internal combustion vehicles.
Electric Drivetrain and Weight Distribution Effects
Image Credit: Ashley Jensen/Facebook.
The Mach-E’s electric powertrain delivers smooth, instantaneous torque across both front and rear motors in AWD configurations. This setup can aid initial traction by allowing fine torque modulation between axles, a benefit over mechanical limited-slip differentials in ice and snow. At the same time, the Mach-E’s heavy battery pack means a low center of gravity and significant mass over the wheels. That mass improves traction compared with lighter vehicles, but it also raises stakes when physics overtakes traction control.
The Mach-E forum members point out that electric AWD systems often allow some rear wheel movement before intervening, a calibration that can feel playful or even Mustang-like in winter slides. In that forum thread, another Mach-E owner experienced a similar “slipping and sliding” behavior in not-so-deep snow. They wrote:
“We had a small amount of snow this evening. I had to go out while it was still snowing, about an inch had fallen. Seemed like my car (4X) was a bit skittish. I always drive in 1-pedal and unbridled mode. The car unexpectedly lost traction a few times and began sliding a bit, even though I was doing less than 40 MPH and not braking. Perhaps just letting up slightly on the accelerator (but not coming off it fully). In a way, it reminded me a bit of driving my old Miata in the snow!”
Some owners report that the traction control logic lets the rear end yaw up to roughly 20 degrees before stabilizing, and this behavior can come across as more “dynamic” than conservative under slippery conditions.
One commenter on the Mach-E forum stressed that while winter tires are “really advantageous because their rubber compound is much stickier,” people often mislabel them as snow tires, which they aren’t. He noted that their stickier compounds give them far better grip, “while all-season tires’ compound, which turns far harder below 40 degrees, lessen their grip the colder the temperature gets.”
The Role of Driving Modes and Regen Braking
Image Credit: Kevin Burnell/Shutterstock.
Modern EVs mediate throttle and brake inputs through software modes that alter power delivery and braking behavior. In the Mach-E, Whisper mode is designed to soften throttle responses and reduce abrupt torque delivery. While that sounds ideal for low-grip conditions, there is nuance beneath the surface.
Some owners argue that regen braking behavior under one-pedal driving or in certain modes can be counterproductive on ice. In one-pedal mode, the vehicle uses regenerative braking aggressively when the driver lifts off the accelerator.
On snow or ice, this can induce unexpected deceleration forces that unsettle traction, especially if antilock braking systems aren’t engaged in the same way they would be under conventional braking. Several Mach-E drivers recommend disabling one-pedal driving in winter and relying on the traditional brake pedal so that ABS can more effectively manage wheel slip when decelerating.
This interplay underscores how EV regen systems layer complexity on traditional traction control. Regenerative braking is highly efficient, but on icy surfaces it demands a different driver instinct than engine braking in a petrol or diesel vehicle.
Tires Still Matter Most
Despite sophisticated AWD and traction control, winter tire choice remains the dominant factor in real-world grip performance. Owners in Mach-E online communities repeatedly emphasize that all-season or performance tires perform poorly on ice and snow. Dedicated winter compounds with aggressive tread patterns can transform handling performance, reducing wheelspin and shortening stopping distances.
One community-reported example contrasts the Mach-E’s poor traction on stock all-seasons with its confident handling after fitting CrossClimate2 or other winter tires. Even a rear-wheel drive Mach-E with proper winter rubber has been reported to climb moderate slopes and maintain directional stability that stock tire setups could not provide.
The takeaway from this viral driveway incident is that physics still has the final word — not a dismissal of EV traction technology, but rather a reminder of its limitations. Traction control, torque vectoring, and regen braking all help optimize grip, yet they cannot create friction where the surface provides almost none. A steep icy driveway effectively becomes a vertical challenge rather than a traction problem when coefficients of friction approach zero.
As one owner in the comments on the original post put it, mastering winter driving now includes understanding the logic behind vehicle systems instead of simply trusting them. Knowing which drive mode and brake strategy suits which surface is part of being a safe driver in an era when software mediates so much of the car’s behavior.
Image Credit: Ashley Jensen/YouTube.
Finally, the Mach-E experience this week is a springboard into deeper questions about EV traction systems and how drivers interpret and interact with them. It is not just about the tech in the vehicle but how the human behind the wheel engages with it in the face of unforgiving winter physics. It’s equally important to stay calm and avoid sudden inputs when your tires skid or lose traction.
Ease off the accelerator immediately and do not slam the brakes, since that can worsen the slide. Look where you want the car to go, not at the obstacle, because your hands tend to follow your eyes. Gently steer in the direction of the skid until the vehicle straightens. If braking is needed, apply smooth, progressive pressure to let ABS work. Once traction returns, straighten the wheels gradually and slow down further to prevent another loss of control.
