Hot on the heels of Congress illegally attacking clean air, a coalition of 11 states has launched an Affordable Clean Cars Coalition to expand access to clean cars even as the federal government tries to raise costs for Americans and drag down the US auto industry during the all-important transition to EVs.

The coalition has been in the works for some time now, but official announcement couldn’t come at a better time.

Just yesterday, Congressional republicans moved on two separate efforts to increase pollution and harm the US auto industry, both by illegally voting to rescind a waiver they don’t have the authority to rescind and voting to send US EV jobs to China and give trillions of dollars to wealthy elites instead.

The new coalition includes 11 states whose governors want to protect their residents from these attacks, and to keep pushing forward on clean cars.

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Here’s the list of governors:

• Gavin Newsom, California
• Jared Polis, Colorado
• Matt Meyer, Delaware
• Maura Healey, Massachusetts
• Wes Moore, Maryland
• Phil Murphy, New Jersey
• Michelle Lujan Grisham, New Mexico
• Kathy Hochul, New York
• Tina Kotek, Oregon
• Dan McKee, Rhode Island
• Bob Ferguson, Washington

The coalition represents over 100 million Americans and around 30% of the US car market. It’s a subset of the 24 states in the US Climate Alliance, a bipartisan coalition of 24 governors that represents ~60% of the US economy and 55% of the US population.

The US Climate Alliance has worked on several initiatives, including on cleaner construction materials, modernized grids, and of course clean cars.

The governors in the new Clean Cars Coalition closely (but not exactly) track the group of “section 177” states which follow California Air Resources Board’s clean air rules.

Section 177 is the portion of the federal Clean Air Act which allows California to ask for a waiver to set its own emissions rules, as long as those rules are stronger than federal rules, and lets other states follow the same rules, as long as they follow California’s rules exactly.

Not every state follows every rule, and each individual rule has somewhere around 10-12 states that follow it. Each of the states involved in today’s effort are section 177 states, but not every section 177 state is represented in this coalition.

States participating in the Affordable Clean Cars Coalition will collaborate to: 

• Develop solutions that make cleaner vehicles more affordable and accessible to all Americans who want them, including by reducing cost barriers, increasing availability of options, and expanding accessible charging and fueling infrastructure at home and in our communities. 
• Continue making progress toward the goals of states’ clean vehicle programs. 
• Defend longstanding authority under the Clean Air Act for states to adopt transportation solutions that best meet their needs and most effectively support their families and communities. 
• Explore opportunities to develop and adopt next-generation standards and programs to further reduce vehicle pollution, as permitted under the Clean Air Act or otherwise, such as solutions that increase consumer access to cleaner cars and low-carbon fuels.
• Collaborate with one another, share evidence-based practices, engage experts, and develop solutions that can be shared across state lines and eventually scaled by the federal government. 
• Foster meaningful engagement with manufacturers, suppliers, dealers, labor unions, business associations, utilities, community-based organizations, charging and fueling infrastructure providers, and others in developing and successfully implementing state transportation solutions. 
• Prioritize efforts that bolster America’s ability to compete and innovate in a growing global market.

Electrek’s Take

Today’s coalition is a similar effort to that which came out of the last time the federal government tried to force dirty air on states.

In fact, the US Climate Alliance was originally formed in 2017, in response to former reality TV host Donald Trump declaring that the US should pull out of the Paris Agreement (which Tesla CEO Elon Musk opposed at the time, but now relishes his chance to be “not good for America or the world“).

Mr. Trump also tried to attack California’s clean air rules many times the first time he squatted in the Oval Office (after losing the 2016 election by 3 million votes), but through a combination of being both morally and legally correct, California eventually won that fight.

Along the way, coalition-building like today’s made it clear who the eventual winner would be. California negotiated a clean car deal on its own with automakers, and several states took California’s side in a lawsuit against republican big government overreach. California even made international agreements and went to international climate conferences in the US’ stead, as Mr. Trump committed itself to diminishing the US on the international stage.

This time, the story looks like it’s starting to play out similarly. And since the players are the same (though some, somehow, are even stupider), and the importance and dominance of electric cars is more apparent now than ever, I wouldn’t bet on the outcome being all that different.

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Volkswagen’s entry-level EV is coming along. The first pre-series battery systems, which will power the ID.2, are now rolling off the assembly line, and Volkswagen is already building parts for the low-cost EV.

Volkswagen produces the first ID.2 parts and battery

It’s been over two years now since VW first introduced the ID.2all, a preview of its upcoming entry-level EV priced under €25,000 ($27,000).

The ID.2 is inching closer to its official debut after the first pre-series battery systems and parts rolled off the assembly line at the Group’s Martorell plant in Spain.

SEAT S.A., which will lead VW’s new Electric Urban Car Family (entry-level models), announced two major milestones this week. The company produced the first body parts on the new PXL press that will be used for the new CUPRA Raval in 2026, followed by the production version of the Volkswagen ID.2.

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Markus Haupt, Interim CEO of the Group’s SEAT and CUPRA brands, said 2025 is a “decisive year” as the company gears up to kick off series production of its new entry-level EV lineup.

During pre-series production, both automated and manual tasks are in place. Once the plant upgrades are complete, Volkswagen said it will have fully robotized processes and around 500 workers.

After investing €300 million ($340 million), the Martorell plant will be able to produce up to 300,000 batteries annually. The company aims to begin series production in 2026.

More affordable EVs are coming soon

The ID.2 will be the first Volkswagen EV based on its new MEB+ platform and low-cost LFP battery system, promising to significantly cut costs.

With “particularly efficient drive, battery, and charging technology,” the ID.2 is expected to have a WLTP range of up to 450 km (280 miles).

Volkswagen says the lower-cost electric car is “as spacious as a golf,” but “as inexpensive as a Polo.” It will start at under €25,000 ($27,000) when it arrives later this year or early 2026.

At the LA Auto Show in November, VW’s tech development head, Kai Grünitz, told Autocar that “huge improvements” are coming, starting with the ID.2. Grünitz promised VW is “going back to where we came from” with inspiration from iconic cars of the past, including the Golf.

One fun feature? The new drive modes. You can switch between “Classic” and “Vintage” themes, and your display cluster will look like it’s straight out of an old-school Beetle or Golf.

The production version of the ID.2 will be one of ten new EVs Volkswagen will launch by 2026. It will be followed by the ID.2 SUV and the smaller, more affordable ID.1.

The ID.1 will kick off a new era as VW’s first software-defined vehicle (SDV) with help from Rivian. Earlier this year, earnings call, VW brand CFO David Powels confirmed the company plans to launch the ID in 2027.

The 2025 version of the Axios Harris poll of brand reputation is out, and it shows a sharp decline in the reputation of Tesla and other Elon Musk-related brands, putting them among the lowest-ranked brands in America, largely due to the toxicity of Musk himself.

The Axios Harris Poll 100 ranks brand reputation of America’s 100 most visible companies, and asks a sample of thousands of Americans how they feel about each brand.

The survey is a collaboration between Axios and Harris that has been going on since 2019, though is based on 20 years of similar Harris Poll research before then, starting in 1999. It has developed its own reputation as a reliable way to take temperature of the American public’s opinion on various high profile brands.

It’s conducted through multiple samples of thousands of Americans, asking them what the most high-profile brands are, how familiar they are with those brands, and their opinions of those brands.

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Tesla has been ranked in the survey many times over the years, with varying results. In the first poll in 2019, it ranked 42nd, with a brand score of 75.4 out of 100.

But Tesla rose from there, ranking 18th in 2020 and reaching a high-water mark as the 8th most trusted brand in America in 2021, with a reputation score of 80.2 out of 100.

Since then, the company’s shine has started to tarnish, and it has been dropping in the rankings. 2022 saw a slight dip to #12 and a score of 79.5, but in 2023 Tesla took a huge hit, dropping a whopping 50 places in the rankings. Axios titled the poll the “year of the tarnished titans” partially due to Tesla’s huge drop.

But the drop didn’t stop there, as Tesla dropped another position in 2024, down to #63, but with a brand score that would still at least be a barely-passing grade (for a lenient teacher), at 72.5 out of 100.

But this year’s poll shows that things just continue to get worse, and in fact, the reputation damage is accelerating.

In 2025, Tesla dropped another 32 places into 95th place, and down to a brand score of 61.3, a huge numerical drop in both position and brand score.

The only companies ranked worse are:

#96 Wells Fargo – which defrauded its customers and was fined ~$3 billion for it. Incidentally, the fraud was uncovered by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, a government organization which Elon Musk is trying to dismantle.

#97 Meta (Facebook) – This feels self-explanatory, but just about everyone is unhappy with Facebook, for reasons with varying levels of rationality behind them.

#98 Twitter – Also run by Elon Musk, which has been flooded with Nazi rhetoric and disinformation after he wasted $44 billion and most of his time on it (though it consistently ranked poorly even before Musk’s takeover0.

#99 The Trump Organization – I mean, it has the name of the highest-profile traitor to America right there in the name.

#100 Spirit Airlines – The “most hated airline in America,” butt of innumerable jokes, with generally low levels of service.

SpaceX, the third company run by Musk on the list, also earned a low reputation score, ranking 86th with a score of 66.4.

Notably, there are several companies with bad reputations ranked above Tesla, many of which have had high-profile scandals either recently or that still loom large in the public consciousness.

For example, those in the title of this article: BP, which presided over the Deepwater Horizon oil spill; UnitedHealth, which is currently imploding and whose former CEO was recently murdered in broad daylight and lots of people kind of didn’t seem to mind it; and Temu, which has faced data privacy lawsuits and is the butt of many jokes for selling low quality products, on top of general anti-China sentiment.

For a few other names, another Chinese app, TikTok, is also ranked above Tesla. As is Fox Corporation, one of the largest purveyors of misinformation and causes of the political division we see in America today. And finally, Boeing, which spent last year wracked by scandals, yet is 7 places above Tesla on this year’s list.

Meanwhile, every other automaker on the list ranked higher than Tesla by at least 35 places (Ford, #60).

Electrek’s Take

So, the news is quite bad for Tesla. But why is Tesla ranked so low?

Well, as you may have divined from our repeated mention of a certain name, the primary reason is Tesla CEO Elon Musk.

As we’ve been warning people about for quite some time now, Tesla CEO Elon Musk is doing his best to completely destroy Tesla’s brand.

Musk has presided over an incredible amount of brand damage to Tesla, with the company ranking the lowest of any US EV brand in a recent survey. This negative perception seems to apply to pretty much any question asked about the brand, including its standout Supercharger network, which suggests that the reason isn’t anything to do with Tesla’s products.

As an EV publication, we have the same mission as Tesla – to advance sustainable transport. In order for that to happen, we obviously want the (formerly) largest EV company in the world to do its job the best it can.

The problem is, Musk doesn’t have that mission, and has been doing his best over the last year(s) to ruin Tesla’s brand perception with increasingly idiotic decisions, both in terms of his public advocacy and his work within Tesla.

Musk’s high-profile political advocacy, which has included support for German neo-Nazis and agreeing with a defense of Hitler’s actions in the Holocaust, among many other white supremacist statements, has driven protests against the company, embarrassed owners and pushed many customers away. The first round of the poll started on Jan 22, which means it captured the period after Musk did two back-to-back Nazi salutes in public.

Beyond politics, Musk’s leadership (or lack thereof) has also resulted in Tesla putting all of its effort into products that either don’t work or don’t sell, instead of focusing on Tesla’s strengths like its cost advantages and Supercharger network.

So, once again, this report shows the effect of the constant drumbeat of bad Tesla business moves and horrendous public behavior by the company’s CEO.

Indeed, it seems like the legend of the “Tesla killer” finally came true – and it’s Elon Musk.

The company’s employees, for the most part, are still working to succesfully to make good electric vehicles. But Musk is spending the money he made from selling EVs to try to ruin EVs – something that the company itself had to call him out on in its quarterly report (and which the formerly-more-lucid Musk would have opposed just a few years ago before he forgot how climate change works).

Unfortunately, Tesla’s board seems content to destroy the company, and its shareholders do too, as they voted again last year to give Musk $55 billion in exchange for his bad leadership, an award that is greater than the total amount of profits Tesla has made over its entire lifetime.

That pay package was stopped by a court for violating corporate law, but Musk has spent his political influence getting Texas to rewrite its business laws to disadvantage shareholders and benefit Musk personally – even as Texas continues to block Tesla from selling cars in the state Musk unwisely moved its headquarters to.

We’re not sure what’s going to make Tesla’s board (which have been dumping TSLA stock like mad) or shareholders wake up to Musk’s destruction of the company, but this report is just one more data point showing how severe the situation has gotten.

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