The Trump administration is suing California over a de facto fuel economy rule that it believes the state is using to an enact a pseudo electric vehicle mandate, The California Post has learned.
The Department of Justice filed the lawsuit Thursday on behalf of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), arguing that the Golden State is violating federal law by forcing state-specific mileage requirements on car manufacturers through the state’s Advanced Clean Cars proposal.
“California is using unlawful policies from the last administration to create exorbitant costs for their citizens — this Department of Justice is proud to stand with President Trump and Secretary Duffy to bring litigation that will make life more affordable for American consumers,” Attorney General Pamela Bondi said in a statement.
A statute under the Energy Policy and Conservation Act prohibits individual states from adopting regulations related to fuel economy, however, California has received several carve outs dating back more than a decade.
California Governor Gavin Newsom took advantage when the California Air Resources Board (CARB) adopted Advanced Clean Cars II in 2022, which required an escalating percentage of new passenger and light truck sales to be zero-emissions, until reaching 100% by 2035. Biden’s EPA then granted California a waiver to enforce the rule.
Newsom also championed several other EV mandates, including the Advanced Clean Trucks (ACT) and the Heavy-Duty Omnibus Law-NOx Regulation.
The regulations became a template for more than a dozen other states, seeking to go further than federal vehicle pollution standards.
Newsom’s standards built upon his predecessor, former Governor Jerry Brown, with the Advanced Clean Cars (ACC I), which covered vehicle model years 2015 through 2025 and sought a 34% reduction in CO2 emissions from new passenger vehicles by model year 2025, and a 27% reduction in overall greenhouse gas emissions by 2035.
But in June, President Donald Trump signed legislation through the Congressional Review Act (CRA) that revoked Newsom’s emission mandates — the validity is currently being challenged in court.
The ACC I, however, remains in place and is what the Trump administration argues amounts to “an illegal electric vehicle (EV) mandate through what are effectively state-specific mileage requirements for car manufacturers.”
The Trump administration argues the stringent emission standards force automakers to produce cars with better gas mileage to comply, thus violating federal law.
“This litigation will help automakers design and produce cars and trucks to meet one federal fuel economy regulation. It was a mistake by Presidents Obama and Biden to enable California to set its own backdoor fuel economy policies, which have now spiraled into a costly patchwork quilt of individual state fuel economy requirements. This litigation will correct that misstep,” said NHTSA Administrator Jonathan Morrison in a statement.
In Response to Trump nixing California’s emission regulations, Newsom signed an executive order doubling down — ordering the California Air Resources Board to develop and propose an Advanced Clean Cars III and offer preferential treatment for car manufacturers who remain compliant with the stringent mandates that were already in place.
The legal battle is now playing out on two fronts — a legal battle in the Ninth Circuit to overturn the CRA revocations and the DOJ lawsuit seeking to block California from enforcing underlying emission rules.
“I was proud to stand alongside President Trump to unveil our plan to eliminate the Biden-Buttigieg EV mandate and allow auto manufacturers to produce cars American families actually want to buy at a more affordable price. But Gavin Newsom is determined to continue pushing Democrat’s radical EV fantasy – even if doing so is illegal,” U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy told The Post in a statement.
