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Only Teslas Exempt from New Auto Tariffs Thanks to 85% Domestic Content Rule

ChickenFlavoredCake | 2025-04-30 05:04 | 1019 views

Comments (121)
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CallMePyro 2025-04-30 05:18

Lucky that the percentage chosen happened to be one that allowed Tesla to qualify for the exemption! Woulda been pretty rough if it had gone the other way... |Rank|Makes|Model|Total Domestic Content| |:-|:-|:-|:-| |1|Tesla|Model 3 Performance|**87.5%**| |2 (tied)|Tesla|Model Y Long Range|**85.0%**| |2 (tied)|Tesla|Model Y|**85.0%**| |3|Tesla|Cybertruck|82.5%| |4 (tied)|Ford|Mustang GT AT|80.0%| |4 (tied)|Ford|Mustang GT 5.0L|80.0%| |4 (tied)|Ford|Mustang GT Coupe Premium|80.0%| |4 (tied)|Tesla|Model S|80.0%| |4 (tied)|Tesla|Model X|80.0%| |5|Honda|Passport AWD|76.5%|

ChickenFlavoredCake 2025-04-30 05:25

It sure does feel that way considering it includes their best selling cars. However, it still excludes S, X and CT which are not selling very well as-is. But if it was to play favoritism, it's a little strange that they didn't set the threshold to 80% instead. It would've included the rest of the Tesla lineup, and just Mustang GT which doesn't really compete with Tesla.

markbraggs 2025-04-30 05:31

Honestly surprised Cybertruck isn’t more

DavidBelgium 2025-04-30 05:47

Probably has to be because the steel of the body parts is made in a factory near me in Belgium, Europe. If this would be made in the US, it would be a lot more domestic I think, maybe even above the Model 3/Y.

wsxedcrf 2025-04-30 06:11

Isn't wheel the one that that is the easiest to swap to another part?

beefstockcube 2025-04-30 06:34

Because now he gets to tell the story of the poor performing models is ‘Tariff related’ not shit car and management related.

ChickenFlavoredCake 2025-04-30 06:39

They release sales data every quarter. They group sales data of all three of those models together, which hasn't been looking great for a while. Do you honestly believe Elon instructed the government to set a threshold that would exclude S/X/CT from tariff free designation, just to make up excuses for why they're not selling well to begin with?

beefstockcube 2025-04-30 06:58

Yup. 100% Look at what a 10% bounce does to the share price. He would 100% destroy large sections of the US economy to sell a story and disadvantage multiple US and every overseas manufacturer. And frankly if a CEO of a company I had my pension in didn’t I’d be annoyed.

Eye_Nacho404 2025-04-30 07:03

Yes, this is what happened

ChickenFlavoredCake 2025-04-30 07:07

That is insane.

Myworkacc215 2025-04-30 07:13

Lucky? Those are the millions Musk gifted to Trump for his election. This is a return of investment.

occio 2025-04-30 08:06

Well, having lots of money *really* helps your luck.

shumpitostick 2025-04-30 08:24

Gotta make it hard for competitors to get this exemption. If it was 80% it would have included some more Tesla cars but it would also have made it easier for other automakers to reach that threshold. I'm sure automakers can swap some components to bump up the number if they are close enough to the threshold

[deleted] 2025-04-30 08:25

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42nu 2025-04-30 08:27

You can tell how much of each is produced by VIN. Yes, they lump them together in the financial report, but the number of each is public knowledge.

42nu 2025-04-30 08:30

I thought the Giga Press for the CT was in Austin? I remember reading all about it years ago. Some Italian company makes presses if I recall correctly and the Giga Press has the highest something ever because it was required to get the liquid alloy to reach every crevice and cool evenly enough everywhere to not be structurally deficient.

mlty 2025-04-30 08:44

They are made by IDRA, an Italian company as you said. They custom made the biggest injection mold press for molten aluminum for Tesla.

katherinesilens 2025-04-30 08:47

It's almost certainly directed at Honda in particular with other domestic auto being desired side targets. Despite being a Japanese label, Honda has actually been nipping at Tesla's heels for domestic production. Ford's Mustangs are quite atypical for the Ford lineup in terms of how much they are made in the US, and in general US automakers other than Tesla are have also been lagging in made-in-America rankings because they love to offshore production in Mexico or Southeast Asia for lower wages. Since it's clearly a marketing/political point (as well as a subsidy) how only Tesla clears the made in America bar compared to the rest of the US automakers, if Honda cleared it too that would heavily undermine the message to the intended audience. For that, the S/X/CT are easy sacrifices. Imo it even seems to build into the image strategy Tesla has been using for them in terms of stratification, so it may be quite deliberate. They've already been doing something similar with the EV tax credit MSRP limits, where Tesla has almost always had these vehicles not qualify or only barely allowed the minimum option to qualify. The S/X/CT aren't as cheap to make but they don't cost *that* much to make; it wouldn't be impossible for Tesla to sell them under the limit, but they seem to be deliberately positioned as a high-value, low-volume, more exclusive product. This has effects like building up the luxury image and relative value perception with buyers who are too wealthy to qualify for the EV credit.

Vibraniumguy 2025-04-30 09:08

1) they probably just set it to the best performing cars. Which are teslas. Aka "we want made in America cars so do at least as good as the most American made cars" 2) This is an absolute win for environmentalism. We went from a series of democrat presidents giving EVs a boost over gas cars and now we actually have a republican doing it as well. Let's fucking go!!!

DrCalFun 2025-04-30 09:59

Fantastic news.

HighHokie 2025-04-30 10:55

I’m with you. If I’m Elon, then I’m greasing palms to make sure all my cars are advantaged.

SpaceXBeanz 2025-04-30 11:02

Thank God lolol

[deleted] 2025-04-30 11:17

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[deleted] 2025-04-30 11:21

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Aggravating-Gift-740 2025-04-30 11:21

If Ford wants to be included I’m sure they can muster up a big enough donation to Trump’s re-election campaign, or buy his trump coins or something.

Capital_Phase4980 2025-04-30 11:33

sure... https://www.nhtsa.gov/sites/nhtsa.gov/files/2025-04/MY2025-AALA-Alphabetical%204_7_2025.pdf kias ev 6 is the only model with 80% no tesla is over 75% its obv. corruption with skewed numbers to fit a narrative.

[deleted] 2025-04-30 12:36

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grizzly_teddy 2025-04-30 12:39

They're being rewarded for being the most American made, and yes also for being friends with Trump. It would seem weird to punish a company that has done an insane amount of effort to keep production as local as possible

Joe_Immortan 2025-04-30 12:55

It’s not hard for competitors to get the exemption. If Tesla can figure out how to source American parts, so can Honda, Ford Chevy, etc.

Longjumping_Bus2395 2025-04-30 12:56

When’s the last time you gave your friend 200+ million dollars?

CTrandomdude 2025-04-30 13:04

According to the article most Teslas do not qualify. So the title is misleading. Only the 3 and Y. The S,X, and Cybertruck do not. No mention of the Semi. Several of the Teslas and Fords are close so hopefully this pushes them to source more parts or move some of those parts production back to the USA. This is good for America. Also motivates all manufacturers to do more in the USA and still have the ability to have at least some parts come in without tariffs.

sielingfan 2025-04-30 13:17

More than half the voting population sounds like a Threat To Democracy^^TM

sielingfan 2025-04-30 13:19

If this doesn't convince Ford to use American parts nothing will.

greyscales 2025-04-30 13:20

The Model 3 and the Model Y are most of the Teslas being sold.

greyscales 2025-04-30 13:20

And by sheer luck, the cutoff is right below the percentage of Teslas two cash cows. Amazing.

mommymilktit 2025-04-30 13:35

It says only Teslas not all Teslas. How is that misleading? Regardless, the 3 and Y account for like 95% of Tesla units sold.

Meepo-007 2025-04-30 13:36

The biggest threat to democracy in this country is the current state of the news media.

jl_23 2025-04-30 13:51

Trump didn’t carry the majority of the popular vote

[deleted] 2025-04-30 13:52

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grizzly_teddy 2025-04-30 14:08

nah that's def not luck lol

[deleted] 2025-04-30 14:25

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goodvibezone 2025-04-30 14:29

Most by volume, not by model.

fanzakh 2025-04-30 14:34

Nah... 82.4% would've made it way clearer. S and X are luxury vehicles anyway.

greyscales 2025-04-30 15:17

Exactly. Tesla is being rewarded, but not for building the most American made cars, but for Elon donating $200m to Trump.

grizzly_teddy 2025-04-30 15:18

meh for both

schaudhery 2025-04-30 15:20

Nothing shocks me anymore. I’m actually surprised the law doesn’t exempt any car manufacturer whose name rhymes with Besla.

ConsistentRegister20 2025-04-30 15:24

Reward the companies selling the most American-made products by Americans using American parts. This is what we want as Americans. Incentives work. The incentives to move manufacturing out of the US worked very well, it's how we got into this situation in the first place.

garibaldiknows 2025-04-30 15:36

Heaven forbid we reward companies who build in the USA.

[deleted] 2025-04-30 15:53

[deleted]

[deleted] 2025-04-30 15:55

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PhEw-Nothing 2025-04-30 15:59

Seriously!

Harryhodl 2025-04-30 16:15

According to cnn he won the popular vote. A simple google will show u. 49.8%

jl_23 2025-04-30 16:16

49.8% < 50% Winning ≠ getting the majority of

Opposite-Knee-2798 2025-04-30 16:20

It doesn’t include the RWD and dual motor model 3, which sell better than the performance.

asds999 2025-04-30 16:29

I see nothing wrong with this. If you hate that Tesla is getting this stop supporting the brand? They are the most American made car. Directly supporting and helping our economy.

DownTimeAllTheTime 2025-04-30 16:51

Yeah it's like saying "we want students to be rewarded for missing as few days as possible. So we're giving a pizza day for every student that missed less than...(checks notes to see their son's absence count) 4 days! Yup anyone with 4 days or less missed gets the pizza party! Yay!" Why not 100% attendance? Why not 6 days or less? Because it makes sure to help his buddy, obviously. I don't think anyone is seriously upset about rewarding US production itself, and anyone implying otherwise needs to move on to the next strawman, because this one is too obvious

Ok-Objective1289 2025-04-30 17:00

Doesn’t change the fact it’s 85% American made

Craigslist_sad 2025-04-30 17:41

Love too live in a corrupt oligarchy!

LetsRollTheBleLine 2025-04-30 17:46

Good news

1960vegan 2025-04-30 17:49

Where's the non-Performance Model 3?

Qs9bxNKZ 2025-04-30 17:56

One ford or all fords?

greyscales 2025-04-30 17:58

So why having the cutoff right at 85%?

sanity4all 2025-04-30 18:03

How do you get to these numbers? Is it by number of parts, weight of parts or price of parts that are used to calculate the domestic percentage? I'm asking out of curiousity. Or was it straight out of ChatGPT?

garibaldiknows 2025-04-30 18:30

You have to pick some %. Setting a standard to aspire to seems fine.

DrixlRey 2025-04-30 18:36

But it’s 85% American made, isn’t this a good thing? Why can’t American cars be made 85% in America?

DavidBelgium 2025-04-30 19:21

I'm talking about the metal that gets fed in the Giga Press.

StdSam 2025-04-30 19:37

Why can’t it be 80% or 90% or 100%? 85% is a cherry picked number.

DrixlRey 2025-04-30 19:39

Because there are zero cars made 100% here so that won’t work. And 40% would just be made in China. So 85% covers most the exceptions of items that has to be made overseas. Chevys are not even close to 80%.

StdSam 2025-04-30 19:44

But 80% is right there. Why pick a number only Tesla qualifies? Sure it’ll make more companies change plans but it definitely looks like favoritism.

DrixlRey 2025-04-30 19:45

It’s because 85% is a good number, for example Chevy are 50% made in America. Is 50% a better number for you? That defeats the whole purpose.

KLiipZ 2025-04-30 19:46

What do you mean “ford is at 80%” that makes no sense

StdSam 2025-04-30 19:48

80% would be a good number for me.

DrixlRey 2025-04-30 19:48

And still only Tesla qualifies…

StdSam 2025-04-30 19:49

Ford would qualify.

DrixlRey 2025-04-30 19:51

Where do you see that? I’m seeing 50% for ford https://fordauthority.com/2024/12/some-ford-f-150-pickups-rank-22nd-on-2024-made-in-america-index/

Stone0777 2025-04-30 20:34

Imagine thinking Elon is running the show.

StdSam 2025-04-30 20:36

https://reddit.com/r/teslamotors/comments/1kb8jnw/_/mpsjn09/?context=1

Not_A_Rioter 2025-04-30 21:06

In the article of this post. The Mustang GT

Kilo_Juliett 2025-04-30 21:21

Where does the non performance model 3 come in at?

BikebutnotBeast 2025-04-30 21:23

Number of parts total sourced from us. So if the car has 1000 parts, at least 850 need to be from the US.

Lets_getouttahere 2025-04-30 21:52

Right, that % is completely accidental and the goal here is setting targets/aspirations.

[deleted] 2025-04-30 22:18

[deleted]

wiggggg 2025-04-30 22:30

Or Ford can adjust and get up to 85%

wiggggg 2025-04-30 22:32

Source? You could import the most expensive, impactful parts. Seems odd if they really count a motor and a fender the same

KLiipZ 2025-04-30 22:41

80% of what though? They have a fleet of 20+ models all with different sourcing methods

55thParallel 2025-04-30 23:04

Because it’s been proven doable by the industry leaders in domestic manufacturing.

StdSam 2025-04-30 23:07

Or they can up the number to 90%

Fratsyke 2025-04-30 23:11

These percentages come from the [Kogod business school 2024 Made in American Auto Index](https://kogod.american.edu/autoindex/2024). Created by professor Frank DuBois, this index bases the percentages on location of production, R&D and headquarters and the AALA domestic score. They then assign a weight to each of these factors and arrive at the Auto index scores. The [AALA domestic listing](https://www.nhtsa.gov/sites/nhtsa.gov/files/2025-02/MY2024-AALA-Percentage-2.4.25.pdf) is the actual official U.S. Department of Transportation's list that objectively (without factor weighting) ranks vehicles based on what percentage of parts come from the US/Canada. However, DuBois argued that this wasn't sufficient to determine what cars were actually being made in the US so he came up with his [own index](https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/04/130430194048.htm).

xsv161 2025-05-01 00:01

Wouldn't surprise me if it's real, that's just how dumb government is. It's the same with firearm laws, 922(r) for example.

mchinsky 2025-05-01 01:17

Maybe they could just have more made in USA components or are Democrats no longer the party of the middle class and a strong manufacturing base and would rather see China and Japan succeed before allowing their political competitor to have a 'win'.?

Nismotech_52 2025-05-01 03:11

Should’ve bought American…

DrixlRey 2025-05-01 04:44

There's only 4-5 other cars that aren't even that popular that would have made it. The other 25 cars are way below 85%, they're like at 60...which is the big issue here.

supermam32 2025-05-01 12:14

All the data makes it pretty clear this isn’t that corrupt, but sure, jump to that conclusion because of your deep bias.

supermam32 2025-05-01 12:16

It would be all of them if it was corruption genius. On the flip side, if even a single Tesla qualified you would be crying these same crocodile tears.

supermam32 2025-05-01 12:19

Yeah, it would be a shame and also the oddest thing in business if a company decided to ditch their highly profitable parter to work with another partner, instead of working with both. You know a company can sell to more than one customer right? I believe it’s encouraged

Superraket 2025-05-01 12:56

The carpets are made in Denmark. So they source a lot of different components outside of the US.

skifri 2025-05-01 13:29

It's not about favoritism. It's about identifying the best performers of the metric they are looking to achieve and incentivizing others to play at the same level, because someone has already proven it is possible.

BadManParade 2025-05-01 13:53

Where’d you get that list

CallMePyro 2025-05-01 13:54

The article :)

dailytrippple 2025-05-01 14:18

Exactly right, never underestimate the government's ability to pick the dumbest way to implement or enforce anything.

BikebutnotBeast 2025-05-01 14:18

American University’s Kogod School of Business. They oversee the Kogod Made in American Index. Researchers there measure the percentage of parts originating in the U.S. or Canada in every car sold in the U.S.

CaptCarlos 2025-05-01 16:08

![img](emote|t5_2s3j5|7846)

greyscales 2025-05-01 16:15

You're right, now it's just about 95% of the sold vehicles.

No0ther0ne 2025-05-01 20:32

I don't think this has as much to do with favoritism as trying to force more domestic production which has been a major theme for this administration specifically. Not to mention that was also a theme for Biden's administration, he just didn't put much actual effort into it other than screwing around with the tax credits.

[deleted] 2025-05-01 21:08

why would they do that? that would cost alot of money

xXKarmaKillsXx 2025-05-01 21:55

😝

Capital_Phase4980 2025-05-02 02:02

" isn’t that corrupt..." followed by "but sure, jump to that conclusion because of your deep bias." the koolaid must be strong.

HenryLoenwind 2025-05-02 03:33

Please don't feed steel sheets into a machine designed to take molten aluminium...

rawasubas 2025-05-02 03:51

Lowering the threshold to include the next non-Tesla models will also include all the rest of the Tesla models. You might end up widening the gap of exempted Tesla vehicles vs those of the competitors.

[deleted] 2025-05-02 05:16

Wild

gandhi_theft 2025-05-02 06:50

Is the software considered in this? If so, how (is that even possible)?

THATS_LEGIT_BRO 2025-05-02 11:36

Cars exempt from the tarriff must (1) meet an 80% content and (2) manufacturer name must start with a "T". haha

scamp9121 2025-05-02 11:44

Not anymore. That’s the point.

gerthdynn 2025-05-03 20:44

Man the M3LR(67.5%) and M3RWD(70%) are so far down the list. Only the performance is above the line? So much for the most popular versions of the car.

rackaveli 2025-05-03 21:38

Enemy of America found here

lake_of_1000_smells 2025-05-04 20:02

This would be intentional

ferrari91169 2025-05-05 02:36

That number sucks, because then basically every single Tesla qualifies and they don't have to do anything to try and make their other vehicles meet a higher threshold. 85% is great, because that means Tesla will have to rework many of their vehicles to try and include more American parts. Why do you want to give Tesla a 100% exemption, that is a terrible idea? You act like this number was cherry picked for Tesla, but you're the one wanting to lower it to a number that would give Tesla 100% exemption, LOL. Seems like you're the one trying to cherry pick to be in Tesla's favor...

abbeynottooshabby 2025-05-05 17:18

I love that the image of this post is of a made in China AliExpress hubcap with an illegal Tesla logo sticker smuggled in the US. Journalism at its finest.

MrWhistles 2025-05-05 19:24

They build the Mustang GT at the Flat Rock Assembly Plant.

nightingaledaze 2025-05-13 19:14

if the mustangs had a sunroof I would've considered them as Mustangs are some beautiful cars! Right now even happier with the Tesla choice as it's mainly made here (USA). That's jobs for locals and parts not shipping needlessly on top of the other perks I know about. Looking forward to learning more and to the tech expanding everywhere. Would love for gas stations to become obsolete because EVs become the affordable option.

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