The July 22-24 telephone survey of 600 likely general election voters found about 55% of participants said it is important for Michigan to compete aggressively to be the center of EV manufacturing. About 24% of voters, however, said they would consider buying an EV as their next vehicle. The poll had a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.
Hesitancy about buying EVs among likely voters presents a challenge for Democrats in swing Michigan as electrification of the auto industry has become both a cultural and substantive flashpoint of the 2024 election. Domestic manufacturers face heightened competition from China and pressure from world governments to curb emissions, but American consumers continue to show strong demand for profit-driving, gas-powered cars, trucks and SUVs.
Republican former President Donald Trump, who was nearly tied in the poll with Vice President Kamala Harris, the presumptive Democratic nominee, has made a blistering critique of the auto industry's transition to EVs a cornerstone of his third White House campaign. It has echoes of how he railed against global trade deals during his successful 2016 bid.
Trump's messaging on EVs has been effective because "he's a master at understanding people's angst and driving wedges into that angst," said pollster Richard Czuba, founder of the Lansing-based Glengariff Group that conducted the poll.
"He looks at that first number (24%) that says how few people would consider an EV for their next vehicle. He understands their angst and concern about it, and that's what he plays off of," Czuba said.
Survey participants gave a wide range of reasons why they would not consider an EV as their next vehicle. The top ones included concerns over lagging charging infrastructure (19%) and vehicle range, the higher upfront cost of EVs compared with gas-powered cars (18%), worse EV performance in cold weather (5%) and general distrust of a technology they deemed too new and unreliable (11%), according to the poll results.
“These are all answers we've heard, but it is notable that we're making this huge transition as an industry, and it's getting caught up in the culture war now,” Czuba said.
The polling in the home state of the domestic auto industry also underscores the ongoing challenge the Detroit Three automakers — Ford Motor Co., General Motors Co. and Stellantis NV — face in moving away from a century of selling petroleum-consuming cars, trucks and vans, one auto analyst said.
"(Tesla, Inc. CEO) Elon Musk has always said we need to make our cars better than EVs in every dimension. That's how you convince the consumer at the end of the day," said Tu Le, who serves as managing director of Sino Auto Insights, an innovation and management consulting firm with offices in Detroit and China.
He emphasized that some legacy U.S. automakers are making progress on providing lower-cost, high-quality EVs, but they are still behind Tesla and emerging Chinese competitors.
"If the (Detroit Three) can't make the pivot to EVs sooner rather than later, they're just going to become American companies," Le warned. "They're going to lose their ability to compete globally. Because the reality is the rest of the world is moving forward with clean energy, and we can't only rely on Tesla."
Ford and GM have made progress on EV sales so far in 2024, but the segment is not yet profitable for either company and industry-wide EV demand in the U.S. has cooled. Facing market pressures, both have scaled back or delayed some of their plans on EVs.
MIXED FEELINGS, PARTY-LINE SPLITS
While less than a quarter of survey participants said they would consider purchasing an electric car sometime soon, about 55% said it was important that Michigan compete aggressively to be at the center of EV manufacturing. A split on personal preference versus industry outlook occurred across all political leanings. "A lot of people see (EVs) as an important component of what the Big Three are going to be in the future," said Dave Dulio, an Oakland University political scientist. "They see their economic health as a reflection of the state's economic health."
But even with those split personal and industry outlooks, Czuba said the polling underscored the stark difference between Democratic, Republican and independent voters on whether Michigan should be a leader in EV production.
The poll found 59% of voters who identify as "strong" Republicans don't think it's important for Michigan to lead the nation in EV production, while 73% of "strong" Democrats said it's important. Independent voters were split 43.4% (important) to 42.6% (not important) on this question, according to the poll.
Trump's base voters, Czuba noted, "don't even think it's important for Michigan to be the center of EV manufacturing."
Republican voters have abandoned past instincts on economic issues to fall in line behind Trump, who has consistently bashed EVs and the Biden administration's support for them on the campaign trail, he said.
"Republican voters have always been the most geared to the economy and towards growth and towards business in Michigan," Czuba added. "That's no longer the case here."
The gap among union versus non-union households was also significant in the home state of the influential United Auto Workers union, though not quite as stark as the political divisions. About 67% of respondents who were part of a union household said it was important for Michigan to lead on EV manufacturing. By contrast, about 51% of non-union household respondents held the same position, Czuba said.
"I think this is a real challenge for policymakers, economic development folks, the automakers, to explain what it means to Michiganders if EV production goes elsewhere," Czuba said. "When you don't have kind of a bipartisan unity or coalition to attract this to the state, it'll go elsewhere."
VOTERS WEIGH IN
Trump has positioned himself as a champion of consumer choice and echoed common concerns about EVs, saying they are too heavy, too costly and do not have enough miles of range before they need to be recharged.
Sherrie Endreszl, 57, of Mackinaw City, said that message resonates with her.
"I'm not ready for the change," said Endreszl, who participated in the survey and indicated she supports the Republican Party and a return of Trump to the Oval Office. "I like the tried-and-true and what I know is dependable."
"I don't want somebody mandating that I have to drive a specific type of car, or telling me I can cook on a certain type of stove," she added, referencing a common Trump label on Biden's EV policies and a separate push to improve energy efficiency standards for gas stoves and ovens.
“I will end the electric vehicle mandate on day one,” Trump said in his recent address at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee.
The former president also claimed the move would result in “saving the U.S. auto industry from complete obliteration, which is happening right now, and saving U.S. customers thousands and thousands of dollars per car."
He and other Republicans have adopted the "mandate" refrain in referring to the Biden administration's extensive web of policies aimed at promoting EV production and adoption. Opponents, most notably, decried draft tailpipe emission standards from the Environmental Protection Agency that — before being scaled back in their final version — might have pushed EV sales in the U.S. to 67% of new car sales by 2032.
The Biden administration has not technically required a transition to electric vehicles in the United States. But it has devoted considerable time and resources to the matter, employing both incentives and punitive regulations.
Its efforts have also included two other key rules aimed at reducing tailpipe emissions; a $7,500 tax credit on qualifying new EV purchases via the climate-minded Inflation Reduction Act; $7.5 billion for EV charger buildout via the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law; IRA-funded manufacturing subsidies to repurpose old industrial centers for EVs; and a set of new tariffs that aim to protect U.S. automakers from competition with China, which has emerged as the world leader in EVs.
Bruce Geist, 62, of Sterling Heights said he supports those efforts from the Biden administration.
"I don't like how controlled our country is by the price of oil," the retired Chrysler employee and self-identified political independent said. "Even though we generate a lot of oil ... still, our economy is highly dependent upon the price of gasoline and other things."
"Plus, of course, climate is a big deal. We have to figure out ways to limit our carbon footprint," Geist said, adding that he thinks consumer vehicles — which make up about 16% of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, per EPA data — are an area where the U.S. can make significant improvements.
LOW SUPPORT FOR TAX DOLLARS FUNDING EVS
Even though the majority of Michiganians support the auto industry leaning more heavily into EV production, most opposed the U.S. federal government using taxpayer dollars to encourage that transition. About 56% disagreed with providing subsidies while 35% supported them, according to the survey.
Eric Sorenson, 44, of Clarkston acknowledged that the federal government has perennially subsidized many areas of the economy, especially the agricultural sector. But he said this issue is different.
"I think food is a required, important thing. It's an expirational product. You know, if you don't maintain the fields, you don't maintain the crops, it's going to be bad from year to year," said Sorenson, an airline pilot who participated in the survey and indicated he supports Republicans.
"But I don't think if we didn't have electric cars by 2030 that it's going to be a huge difference in our country," he added.
Some survey participants, like Rosalee Dood, 57, a Democrat from Hudsonville, said they don't mind their tax dollars supporting EVs. She said she strongly supports those actions from the Biden administration because of her concerns over climate change.
"I just think that if our taxes are going towards things that are going to improve the environment for everyone..., then we don't care what we pay in taxes," Dood said.
Czuba and Dulio, the OU political scientist, both agree Trump's messaging on EVs has resonated more with voters in Michigan than Biden's messaging.
That puts Harris, the new presumptive Democratic nominee, in a difficult position of having to defends Biden's policies on the campaign trail in the face of Trump's attacks and a skeptical public, Dulio said.
"People in Michigan are more aligned at this point with Donald Trump than they are the Biden-Harris administration on this issue," Dulio said.
U.S. OR CHINA?
To counter Trump's strong connection with voters on the personal headaches of EV adoption, Czuba said Democratic candidates in Michigan would be wise to focus on the external threat to Michigan and U.S. autos from an ascendant China. He pointed out U.S. Rep. Elissa Slotkin, D-Holly, as a particularly effective communicator on the subject.
"I understand that a lot of Michiganders aren't interested in driving an electric vehicle," Slotkin, also a U.S. Senate candidate, said in a recent interview with The News.
Michigan and fellow Midwestern battleground Wisconsin frequently rank in the bottom two for EV adoption among states that Biden won during his successful 2020 White House bid.
Aware of that political reality, Slotkin has tried to communicate her own reluctance on EVs while still promoting them as important to U.S. business and national security interests.
"I live on my farm on a dirt road, nowhere near anything like charging infrastructure. I don't drive an electric car. I probably can't drive an electric car for the foreseeable future," Slotkin said. "But man, if someone's going to build the next generation of electric vehicles, I want it to be the United States and not China."
Her potential general election opponent Mike Rogers, R-Brighton, has invoked national security to make the opposite argument, saying in a Detroit News commentary, "(t)here’s almost no way you can build an EV without getting into bed with China."
"I’ll work with anyone to help Michigan’s auto industry, and that includes abolishing these reckless and job-killing mandates," Rogers said.
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