- Trump administration orders shutdown of 8,000 EV charging ports managed by GSA.
- The agency also oversees roughly two-thirds of the government’s 650,000-vehicle fleet.
- If the GSA offloads its fleet of new EVs, it’ll have to replace them with gas-powered cars.
President Donald Trump is putting the brakes on electric vehicles in government fleets, ordering thousands to be sold and shutting down their charging stations at federal buildings. Framed as a cost-cutting measure, the decision could ironically end up costing the administration $1 billion.
Read: Trump To Cut Off All 8,000 EV Charging Ports At Federal Buildings
The General Services Administration (GSA), which oversees about two-thirds of the federal government’s 650,000 vehicles, currently manages around 8,000 EV chargers across government buildings. These stations serve both federally owned and personal EVs driven by government employees. But according to recently leaked emails, those charging contracts are being canceled, and the stations will be “turned off at the breaker.”
Unplugging the Investment
Under the Biden administration, the GSA received $975 million to upgrade federal buildings with new and sustainable technologies, including charging points for EVs, The Verge reports. The federal government signed an executive order to only buy electric light-duty vehicles by 2027.
The GSA will also begin to offload as many as 25,000 EVs purchased during the Biden administration. Speaking with Politico, a former GSA official said these EVs may only sell for 25% of their original value, potentially resulting in a loss of as much as $225 million. And since those EVs will need to be replaced with gas-powered cars, the federal government could end up spending an additional $700 million.
Cutting Costs, And Then Spending
According to the same ex-GSA official, the federal government has spent approximately $300 million to install and activate charging points. Taking these chargers offline could cost between $50 million and $100 million.
In an internal email explaining the decision, the GSA stated it “has worked to align with the current administration [and] received direction that all GSA-owned charging stations are not mission critical. Neither Government Owned Vehicles nor Privately Owned Vehicles will be able to charge at these charging stations once they’re out of service.”
That leaves an obvious question: if the goal is to cut government spending, why take a billion-dollar loss in the process? Selling EVs at a fraction of their cost, spending hundreds of millions to replace them with gas-powered cars, and shutting down infrastructure that was already paid for doesn’t exactly scream fiscal responsibility.
