From Tesla To Ford, Auto CEOs Are Begging Trump For Tariff Clarity

Good morning! It’s Tuesday, April 8, 2025, and this is The Morning Shift: Your daily roundup of the top automotive headlines from around the world, in one place. This is where you’ll find the most important stories that are shaping the way Americans drive and get around.

In this morning’s edition, we’re taking a look at the lengths automaker CEOs are going to for clarity on tariff implementation, as well as Stellantis’ plans to breathe new life into Alfa Romeo and Maserati. Plus, Chinese authorities go anti-autonomy, and the EU is shifting its car sales priorities towards India.

American automakers are particularly affected by the latest Trump administration tariffs. They’re exposed on the parts end, paying more for the bits and pieces they build cars out of, as well as to any retaliatory tariffs that may come out of the rest of the world. The CEOs of those automakers aren’t always against tariffs outright, but they’d certainly like to tweak a thing or two if they can — just ask Ford’s Jim Farley, who went on Fox News to indirectly speak to President Trump. The Detroit Free Press has the writeup:

Farley appeared Friday evening on “The Ingraham Angle” with host Laura Ingraham — a show Trump is known to watch — to answer a series of questions about Ford’s reaction to tariffs a day after the automaker rolled out a campaign offering U.S. car buyers employee pricing on most of its vehicles.

In the wide-ranging interview, Farley said Ford is viewing the tariffs as a chance to “gain some business.” He also said if the focus of tariffs is on fair trade with foreign rivals, that’s good. But he indicated concerns around tariffs on parts.

Farley isn’t the only American automaker CEO trying to get Trump’s ear on tariffs. Even Trump’s long time pal Elon Musk has been doing the dance of making indirect statements that are firmly directed at the White House. From the Washington Post:

In an interview with Italian Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini over the weekend, Musk also said he would like to see a “free trade zone” between Europe and the United States: “At the end of the day, I hope it’s agreed that both Europe and the United States should move ideally, in my view, to a zero-tariff situation.”

Musk also said that he would like more freedom for people to move between countries in Europe and the United States and work in either “if they wish.”

“That has certainly been my advice to the president,” he said.

Musk has never before been a proponent of open borders, but remember that he has at least a little bit of experience in keeping the quiet part quiet.

Alfa Romeo makes some very cool cars. Maserati also makes some cars. Neither has done fantastically in the market when compared to competitors like BMW or Mercedes, but it seems Stellantis is finally getting around to working on that. The company has hired McKinsey & Company — the consulting firm famous for such moves as consulting for Enron, masterminding the opioid epidemic, and being a major contributor to the 2008 financial crisis — to make Alfa Romeo and Maserati cool again. From Automotive News:

Stellantis Chairman John Elkann has asked the consultancy to assess options for the brands including partnering with other companies to access new technology, sources said.

While some Asian companies expressed interest, the considerations are at an early stage, the people said. Longer-term scenarios include spinning off Maserati, the sources said.

“McKinsey has been asked to provide its considerations regarding the recently announced U.S. tariffs for Alfa Romeo and Maserati,” a spokesperson for the brands said, declining to further comment. McKinsey did not immediately reply to requests for comment.

Credit where credit is due here, McKinsey might be the master of making things popular. True, those things are usually “Enron stock” or “OxyContin” or “mortgage-backed securities” — y’know, moral superfund sites — but boy does McKinsey make them cool. This will be how we all find out that Alfa Romeo is actually headquartered in Omelas or something. 

Late last month, a Xiaomi SU7 running in driver-assist mode crashed in China, killing three. The SU7 had a Tesla-style LiDAR-free arrangement, which has been the topic of much debate in the intervening weeks. Now, the Chinese government is getting involved, and it’s asking drivers to kindly refrain from using such systems for a bit until this whole thing is worked out. From Bloomberg:

Chinese authorities warned drivers to stay vigilant and reduce the use of advanced driver-assistance technology during the Qing Ming Festival holiday, after three people died in an accident involving a Xiaomi Corp. electric car just over a week ago.

Signs saying the use of smart-driving systems are banned, or suggesting drivers deploy them with caution, were spotted by social media users during the April 4-6 long weekend on expressways in Zhejiang, Jiangsu and Anhui provinces, according to local media reports. The Xiaoxiang Morning Herald also cited Anhui traffic police telling the public to avoid using advanced driver technology if possible.

The Qing Ming Festival involves plenty of travel, so it’s not unreasonable for Chinese authorities to pay extra attention to car use in that period — it’s not all that dissimilar from those traffic signs warning you to click it or ticket when you set out to see family for Thanksgiving. Just, imagine if our government actually cared about regulating semi-autonomous tech on those travel holidays. 

With so many tariffs — and so much uncertainty around them — in the United States, the regulators of Europe are pitching another priority for the continent’s automakers: India. The EU is looking for a zero-tariff deal with the nation, a massive change from Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s famously high import taxes on vehicles. From Reuters:

India is open to the phased reduction of tariffs to 10% from more than 100%, two industry sources and a government official said. That is despite industry lobbying for India to retain at least a 30% tariff even if it starts reducing the levy, and also not tinker with import duties on EVs for four more years to protect domestic players.

India makes sense to target as a market, given its incredible population size and vast expanses of terrain inhospitable to public transit. India loves its vehicles — there’s a reason so many motorcycles are built there — and could be a nice substitute automotive market if this whole “United States” thing doesn’t work out. That’s why they call it the American Experiment, right?

I never even saw “Captain Phillips,” but that line will be burned into my head until the end of time. 

I’d never actually watched the music video for this track before, and dear lord that mouth is truly horrifying.