KUDLOW: Biden's Push for Electric Vehicles Raises Economic Concerns

So, I certainly hope that a former attorney general, William Barr, the House Oversight Committee chairman, James Comer, and others can stop the new ultra-radical auto emission standards put out by the EPA allegedly using the Clean Air Act to regulate tailpipe carbon emissions.

It remains to be seen whether the Supreme Court decision in West Virginia v. EPA, which was intended to roll back the ever-growing, ever-powerful regulatory state, is applicable, or whether the Republican House can use its power of the purse to defund the relevant divisions of the EPA. Regardless, it’s important.

What the Biden administration is doing is not about clean air; the U.S. already has the cleanest air of any large economy. No, what it’s trying to do is destroy the fossil fuel industry, period. It’s also aiming for command and control over the entire U.S. auto industry.

This is the biggest industry takeover since Joe Stalin met Vladimir Lenin. And I don’t recall any congressional laws stipulating that the EPA or any other federal regulator can take over an entire industry. Where’s it say that?

New-car dealers who are going to be run out of business constitute the fifth-largest industry in this country, with total sales of $1.2 trillion.

They rank behind banking, health care, cosmetics, and hospitals.

Certainly, small and mid-size car dealers will be blown up and every employee will lose their job. Am I exaggerating? I don’t think so.

There’s more: The attack on the fossil fuel industry, the reduction in gasoline usage — which means reducing drilling, pipelining, refining, and all the refined petroleum products that are so important to the everyday lives of American households — was the Biden agenda from day one.

The president has been captured by the most radical climate people, who also double as central-planning socialists.

Millions and millions of jobs will be lost, and everything President Biden says about creating new jobs through these tailpipe restrictions is a flat out lie. Is this going to have any impact whatsoever on the climate? Highly doubtful.

Consumers don’t want EVs because they’re too expensive. They’re not affordable, except for rich people.

Survey after survey shows that 50-60 percent of folks have no interest in unaffordable EVs. What’s more, we don’t have the infrastructure in place to end gas-powered cars in 10-12 years. There are not enough charging stations — and anyway they take too long to charge the cars.

Probably most important, our electricity grid is not ready for the added burden if the Bidens had their way and two-thirds of all new cars were in play in a dozen years. Where’s this added electricity going to come from?

The Bidens are trying to shut down fossil fuels that supply roughly 80 percent of the new power required for all these EVs. So, where’s this power going to come from? Wind farms? Solar? I don’t think so.

There’s no transition. There’s no thoughtfulness. There’s no infrastructure.

There has never been an alternative infrastructure with facts and figures and common sense laid out by these left-wing rabid climate people. They are dreamers and they are going to ruin this country.

Ålso, where are we going to get the minerals for the batteries, since the Biden dreamers won’t provide permits to mine for them? Well, I know, and you know, and they may know that this is the China bailout program.

Think of this: The Bidens still have not put up a permit for the rich Iron Range mineral deposits up in Minnesota by Lake Superior. Still haven’t done it. Or Texas, or the Dakotas. Incredible.

So, we’ve got a bunch of electric cars coming down the road with insufficient electricity, insufficient battery minerals, almost nonexistent supply chains — and the product is too expensive for the American middle class.

Really? That’s honestly what they’re doing? Well, the answer is yes if they’re not stopped.

My message to you is simple: Take great care of your current car.

Wash it, polish it, detail it. Take care of the battery. Change the oil.

Try to stay friendly with your local gas station or dealer service shop, but then again, all those jobs may evaporate because of the Biden geniuses. Think of that. What a sad tale.