Yow and OUCH!

The knives are out at Ford’s EV division, and I sure hope their UAW members enjoyed the few weeks of living large they had before getting kicked to the #Bidenomics curb.

It turns out the shining star in the EV firmament Ford thought they had was actually more of a dwarf star, and rapidly turning into a black hole. Execs have unsheathed the corporate katana, and gone to work slashing away on the production numbers.

Ford Cuts Electric F-150 Plans in Ominous Sign for EV Market

Ford Motor Co. is cutting 2024 production goals in half for its F-150 Lightning plug-in pickup truck — its signature electric vehicle — due to slowing demand for battery-powered models.

The automaker now intends to build 1,600 of the trucks a week next year at its plant in Dearborn, Michigan, down from a previous plan to manufacture 3,200 weekly, a company spokeswoman said. Ford has been informing suppliers of the production cuts on a model Chief Executive Officer Jim Farley once said was “a test for adoption for electric vehicles” in America.

The move comes as Ford scales back spending on electric vehicles by $12 billion and after it downsized by nearly half a battery factory it’s building in Michigan. Farley has said the robust EV demand the company expected hasn’t materialized because potential buyers are balking at high prices and spotty charging infrastructure.

…Ford also is lowering production of its electric Mustang Mach-E in Mexico and put on hold plans for a second battery factory in Kentucky.

“We will continue to match production to customer demand,” Ford said in a statement.

Employees have to be very nervous about this news. Where less than a year ago a third shift had been added at the plant making Lightnings, by this October a shift – and 700 workers – was already being cut. And now half of what they are still producing is being dropped as well? So not good.

Motor Trend is pretty merciless in their assessment of the situation, flat out saying Ford brought this misery on themselves. It comes down to the consumer’s wallet. It still has to be perceived to be worth the money even if it taps being “affordable.”

…Are the walls crumbling in on the grand electric vehicle experiment? Definitely not. A major reason for Ford’s reevaluation of Lightning demand is its price, and it doesn’t take a long look in the MotorTrend news archives to understand what happened here. And it was something Ford did to itself.

The Lightning was supposed to be somewhat affordable, with a starting price of $41,669 when it went on sale in May 2022. That price was a mirage; the truck started at $52,000 when it went on sale (and snagged our 2023 Truck of the Year award).

…Ford has saddled the F-150 Lightning a number of price hikes, diminishing the everyman appeal a bit more each time. At one point, the price of the Lightning Pro had jumped a staggering, almost inconceivable $20,100 more than its original base price. Things got better in July, with the Pro dropping by almost $10,000 to $51,990—still a long way from the $41,000 we were promised. Even so, the optics weren’t great, and the $51,990 base price doesn’t get shoppers in the door like a $41,000 MSRP would.

We would be loathe not to mention our own mixed feelings about our time with the truck during our long-term test, too. We’ve had qualms about efficiency and range prediction, towing frustrations, and groaned about expensive subscription features. In some ways, our trucks didn’t meet our expectations—and so there may be an issue with consumer expectations versus electric pickup realities.

Ford’s overall EV pains go hand in hand with the problems they’re experiencing with grand plans in the works building their own battery factories to supply these EV production lines. Back in September, I wrote about UAW President Shawn Fain’s freakout – in the middle of his D-3 strikes – as Ford announced they were pausing construction on their first big battery project in MI. Fain blew a gasket, accusing the company of using the plant – with its union jobs – as a bargaining intimidation tool.

…United Auto Workers (UAW) President Shawn Fain blasted Ford, saying the announcement was “a shameful, barely-veiled threat by Ford to cut jobs…. We are simply asking for a just transition to electric vehicles and Ford is instead doubling down on their race to the bottom.”

It turns out it was a pause as promised. Unfortunately for the union, the plant is moving forward at half the size previously planned, with 40% of the GW production (20GW instead of the original 35GW), with a shade over half the workforce previously promised, and the sister plant scheduled for Kentucky isn’t going to happen any time soon, if at all.

Ford Motor said Tuesday that it was resuming work on an electric vehicle battery plant in Michigan but significantly scaling back its plans in part because of slow E.V. adoption in the United States.

A company spokesman said that Ford now expected the plant in Marshall, Mich., to create 1,700 jobs rather than 2,500, but that it still expected production to begin in 2026.

Demand for electric vehicles is “not growing at the rate that we originally expected,” said the Ford spokesman, T.R. Reid. In the most recent quarter, large auto companies like Ford reported that E.V. sales had increased, but not at a rate sufficient to keep up with the Biden administration’s ambitious goals.

In another township in MI, the snag isn’t EV demand declining. It’s local opposition getting some teeth and muscle against a Chinese battery manufacturing operation planned for their community, which had been facilitated against the express wishes of the public by an acquiescent town council.

… Back to present day, Green Township, Michigan, near Big Rapids, is the site of a propsed Chinese Communist Party battery plant for electric vehicles owned by Gotion. Despite massive public outcry against the plan, the township board voted 7-0 to not only allow the plant, but to give the Chinese a 30 year abatement on property taxes. Chinese workers were also going to brought in and housed at Ferris State University.

The people launched a massive recall effort. During the fight, the board was warned by the Michigan State Government that they were violating campaign finance laws with their ads againt the recall, but the board didn’t care. The Michigan Secretary of State never followed through on her threat to charge them (shocking-not).

By the end of last month, two board members had resigned and all of the other five had been vanquished in the recalls. The new council has taken their overwhelming mandate to heart, and wasted no time going to war on the Chinese battery factory.

… During a special meeting on Sunday, the newly elected Green Charter Township board officially changed the township’s position on the $2.36 billion development, which promises to hire about 2,350 people in Mecosta County.

…While the former township board had supported the project, the new board voted Sunday to officially rescind that support.

The vote came about three weeks after the new board also rescinded the township’s support for extending water lines from Big Rapids to the Gotion project, new Supervisor Jason Kruse told Bridge Michigan.

…The Green Charter Township election results are the most definitive backlash among the Michigan communities that, over the past year, have mounted fights against the massive factories that have been subsidized by the state.

Since early 2022, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and her administration — seeking billions in investment and promises of thousands of jobs from the EV industry — pledged about $6 billion in support for five major EV projects, including over $1.2 billion total in direct awards and land preparation funding.

Today, most of the projects face delays as manufacturers reset their production volume amid a slower-than-expected market, Bridge reported in late November.

There are such encouraging signs everywhere that the growing rally cry is “We’re not gonna take it anymore.” Be it climate mandated transitions to products no one wants unless they want one, or literally giving away the farm to indulge the cultists at the expense of the people who live there, Americans are finding their voices and hanging on to their wallets.

The befuddlement of our overlords at the resistance and their impotence curbing it is such fun to watch.

And SO heartening.