Fuel industry group targets Biden and Democrats in key states over emissions standards

A fuel industry group is launching a new $6.6 million ad buy criticizing President Joe Biden and Democratic Senate candidates in key swing states over the administration’s new emissions standards that are expected to lead to dramatic cuts in the production of gas-powered cars.

The ads from the American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM) start Monday and will air in various television and digital markets in Michigan, Pennsylvania, Nevada, Ohio, Montana, Wisconsin, Texas, Georgia and Arizona, the group told NBC News.

Even as the race between Biden and former President Donald Trump is expected to draw a historic amount of spending, the only groups aside from pro-Trump outfits spending significant money on ads attacking Biden in recent months are related to the oil industry.

Warning the Biden administration’s new rules will “ban most new gas cars,” the narrator in the new AFPM ad criticizes Democratic senators for not blocking the rule and directs viewers to call on them to change their mind.

“There’s still time for our senators to make a U-turn,” the ad’s narrator says, depicting a car driving on the highway and missing warning signs before driving to the precipice of a cliff. “Tell them to overturn Biden’s car ban before it’s too late to turn around.”

It’s a high-stakes issue for the AFPM, whose board of directors has representatives from key petrochemical companies including Marathon, Chevron, Citgo, ExxonMobil, Valero and others.

But Chet Thompson, the group’s president, told NBC News in an interview there’s a “disbelief” among consumers that such a dramatic shift in the automobile industry could be on the horizon. And he believes the group’s broader ad campaign — which it has spent more than $17 million on since last fall — will be effective because of how personal the issue is to consumers.

“I can’t think of too many policies that would have a bigger impact on real people’s lives than this one,” Thompson said.

“It’s an issue that almost everyone can relate to, it’s very personal,” he continued. “People pick cars that meet their needs and their lifestyle, and now the federal government, of all entities, is going to limit that choice and limit people’s freedoms.”

The Biden administration has prioritized a handful of policies aimed at reducing vehicle emissions. It has provided billions of dollars in grants to boost the electric vehicle industry, and tax incentives to ease the cost burden on consumers looking to shift to electric vehicles.

It’s part of a larger carrot-and-stick approach: The Environmental Protection Agency finalized new tailpipe emission limits in March that it said would “avoid more than 7 billion tons of carbon emissions” and “accelerate the transition to clean vehicle technologies.” (Agencies are also pursuing other related rules.)

How does the EPA expect car manufacturers to hit those targets? It predicts that electric vehicles would make up between 30%-56% of “new light-duty vehicle” sales by 2032. Electric vehicles made up less than 8% of the national car market in 2023, according to Cox Automotive, an increase from 2022.

“These strongest-ever pollution standards for cars solidify America’s leadership in building a clean transportation future and creating good-paying American jobs, all while advancing President Biden’s historic climate agenda,” EPA Administrator Michael Regan said in a March statement announcing the rule. “The standards will slash over 7 billion tons of climate pollution, improve air quality in overburdened communities, and give drivers more clean vehicle choices while saving them money.”

Thompson repeatedly stressed during his interview that his group isn’t against electric cars (its members are also involved in manufacturing those, too). But he argued the emission standards are too harsh, and that combined with a potential slowdown in the market for electric vehicles, manufacturers will have to deprioritize gas cars even more in order to sell enough electric vehicles to meet emissions standards.

“If an EV works for someone and it meets their family needs and their budget, have at it, it’s great. Our members make that all possible,” Thompson said. “For us, it’s about the fact that EVs aren’t appropriate for everybody and that consumers in this country should have the ability to pick a car that meets their needs.”

The debate over electric vehicles has become politically charged. Biden and many Democrats have argued the standards are an important marker in their quest to combat climate change.

But Republicans have furiously cast the strategy as not just disruptive to consumers, but as an affront to those whose jobs are linked to the gas-powered automobile industry. For instance, Trump recently warned that Biden’s auto policies would lead to a “bloodbath” in the economy.

Polling on the issue has been mixed. A 2023 Pew Research Center survey found that 59% of American adults opposed phasing out new gasoline-cars by 2035, while 40% favored the concept. (While the Biden administration hasn’t gone that far, some states like California have.) In battleground Michigan, the cradle of the auto industry, likely voters were split in a late-February poll over whether they supported the transition to electric vehicles.

And in a spring NBC News focus group with Michigan residents in union households, only two of the 15 participants said they supported the new federal emissions standards, though none said the debate would weigh on their vote.

The public polling shows a deep partisan divide on the issue, with Republicans far more likely to oppose these kinds of policies and Democrats more likely to be supportive. That said, the AFPM has shared polling that shows more clear opposition when the policies are described as “bans.”

On top of Biden, all of the lawmakers mentioned in the AFMP’s new ads are Democrats. Some are incumbents facing tough re-election fights (like Wisconsin Sen. Tammy Baldwin, Pennsylvania Sen. Bob Casey, Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown and Nevada Sen. Jacky Rosen); others are House members looking for a promotion to the Senate (like Arizona Rep. Ruben Gallego, Michigan Rep. Elissa Slotkin and Texas Rep. Colin Allred); and others are incumbents not facing the voters this fall (like Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly, Michigan Sens. Gary Peters and Debbie Stabenow, and Georgia Sens. John Ossoff and Raphael Warnock).

While Thompson has called on opponents of the rule to reach out to Republicans before, none of these ads mention a GOP lawmaker.

Thompson said the lawmakers highlighted in the ads are the ones the group wants to get on the record ahead of attempts to overturn these rules through the Congressional Review Act, a law that allows Congress to nix certain agency rules.

Congress has held votes aimed at rolling back some of the administration’s related rules, but even as they’ve won some bipartisan support (including from Democrats in tough re-election fights, like Ohio’s Brown and Montana Sen. Jon Tester), the efforts have fallen short of a vetoproof majority.

But with the November election drawing nearer, he warned that supporters of the emission rules could “get the wrath of the voter.”

“If you take the right position on this issue, you’re with your people,” he said. “This is a sleeper issue that is really going to move people the more they find out about it.”

This article was originally published on NBCNews.com