At first glance, the coming second Trump administration sounds like bad news for Rivian. Donald Trump has openly mocked EVs and is buddy-buddy with the head of a rival EV company, Elon Musk.
But as we’ve all learned over the past nine years, conventional wisdom is not all that useful in understanding what Trump will or won’t do.
“It’s difficult to really accurately estimate the policy implications for another four years of a Donald Trump presidency,” said Joe Sacks, executive director of the EV Politics Project, a pro-EV group founded by a Republican strategist that aims to disentangle EVs from partisan culture wars.
EV industry-watchers interviewed by WGLT say electrification is still where the auto industry is headed – and that won’t change. But the pace of that transition and America’s role in it are certainly up for grabs, with significant policy changes expected around government’s role in influencing demand.
“Electric vehicles still have a very bright future with President Trump,” said Heather Reams, president of Citizens for Responsible Energy Solutions, a Republican-aligned group that advises on clean energy policy. “He’s very focused on the economics of any industry, but including the EV industry. And if there’s demand, he’s gonna want the United States to fill that demand.”
A polarizing product
The stakes are high for Bloomington-Normal, where Rivian makes its EVs at a plant with 8,000 workers. Rivian is the community’s second-largest employer, behind only State Farm. If Rivian struggles and cuts its workforce or pulls back on its investments here, the economic impact could be significant.
We’ve hitched our economic wagon to an industry that’s – like or it not – uniquely polarizing. Trump didn’t trash talk State Farm or the property-casualty insurance industry much on the campaign trail.
“They don’t work in the cold, and they don’t go far. Other than that, I think they’re wonderful,” Trump said at a campaign event in March. He later softened his tone on EVs, especially after earning Musk’s endorsement.
Part of it is self-inflicted. The auto industry itself initially linked climate change – a political flashpoint – with the kind of car you drive. (Remember Nissan’s polar bear ad?) Trump and others have used that as an opening to falsely describe changes to emission standards as a ban on gas-powered cars.
“EVs are going to have to make their case as to why they’re important to the American economy,” said Reams, who said the election will lead to “significant policy changes” related to EVs.
Companies like Rivian and their customers have benefited from federal tax credits for EV purchases, which Trump opposed, stemming from President Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act. On the immediate chopping block, Sacks said, could be a tax credit loophole that’s made leasing EVs cheaper than buying. Other Biden-era moves, like money for more charging stations, are already in motion and less prone to policy whiplash.
“Subsidies and tax benefits that go to the EV industry broadly and to consumers that make the EV momentum really strong right now – tens of thousands of jobs being created, billions of dollars flowing into these communities – I think all of that funding will be both questioned by the Trump administration and of course a Republican Congress,” Sacks said.
Fewer incentives could hurt a younger company like Rivian compared with a more established competitor like Tesla. Rivian’s stock fell sharply Wednesday before recovering.
“I wouldn’t put too much stock – no pun intended – into what happens on the day-to-day of the stock market, especially after an election,” said Nick Nigro, founder of the policy and data research firm Atlas Public Policy. “The most valuable automotive company in the world is an electric vehicle manufacturer. Their stock went up a lot yesterday, and that’s likely because the market looks at them as being advantaged. It’s not just a matter of which technology is best. It’s gonna be, which company is set up best for the near-term and that’s what’s going to determine whether they succeed.”
Seeing opportunity
That comes down to product quality – and that’s a space Rivian can compete.
“People want to have choices,” said Reams. “They don’t want the government telling them they must drive an EV, or they don’t want the government shifting policy to make it that car manufacturers can only make electric vehicles. And that’s really where the Biden administration has been leaning in.”
Instead, she said Republicans have an opportunity to invest in building out the EV supply chain here rather than overseas where it’s concentrated today. There’s also opportunity for new trade agreements with allies to sell American-made EVs in places still interested in aggressively decarbonizing, like Europe.
“For us to be able to compete internationally, we have to produce what the world wants. And that would be electric vehicles,” Reams said.
Rivian declined to comment for this story. But federal policy is a priority within the company: Rivian has spent at least $620,000 lobbying Congress and the Biden administration since 2023 on issues like tax credits, manufacturing incentives and EV charging, according to federal lobbying disclosures.
EVs could still get more popular in the U.S. even without incentives — if there are improvements in technology. To get there, the U.S. needs to increase funding for basic research into batteries and related technology, said Steven Cohen, professor and expert in environment policy from Columbia University.
“In general, the motor vehicle doesn’t necessarily need lots and lots of subsidies,” said Cohen. “Henry Ford invented the Model T, and that revolutionized motor vehicles. But he didn’t build any roads. We need the government to do that. New technologies often require some kind of government co-investment.”
To do that, policymakers and EV makers will have to speak the same language. EVs are not exclusively a Democratic issue; Rivian came to Normal in 2017, during Trump’s first term and during former Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner’s tenure.
“We have work to do to make sure we can help build bipartisan support and nonpartisan support for electrification,” said Ben Prochazka, executive director of the Electrification Coalition advocacy group. “Electrification is really about our economic and national security and U.S. competitiveness.”
That could mean more talk about jobs and energy security, and less about climate and polar bears.
For Bloomington-Normal, Joe Sacks from the EV Politics Project said we should be vocal about Rivian’s impact on the local economy.
“They’ll be setting the scene and creating a permission structure for politicians to not be EV averse but to embrace EVs,” Sacks said. “You all have a wonderful story to tell.”
