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The Lying Is Reflexive
May 3, 2026
Posted 2 hours ago by
More details here: Asked for evidence, the White House cited recent expansion plan announcements from carmakers Hyundai, Stellantis and Honda In most cases, these announcements represent reallocations of investments at existing facilities, not newly built plants. And they may or may not come to fruition. It is premature for the president to take credit for plant expansion given his short time in office, said Dimitry Anastakis, a University of Toronto business history professor and author of the 2024 book The North American Auto Industry since NAFTA.
“Plants are planned years in advance,” he said. No kidding. And companies have learned that they too can lie in order to fluff the president and get away with it so it’s entirely likely that none of these “plans” are even serious. But to the extent they are real, they are something like this: Stellantis: In late January, the Dutch company that owns Chrysler, Jeep, Fiat and other car brands announced that it would invest 5bn in the US, including reopening an assembly plant in Belvidere, Illinois, that once produced Jeep Cherokees and had been shuttered since February 2023. The company now plans to make midsize trucks there starting in 2027. Whoop-dee-do. This is pathetic: Greig Mordue, a manufacturing policy professor at McMaster University, said companies like Hyundai, Honda and Stellantis are likely preparing to accelerate already decided launches to adapt to political realities. “They will be looking at models that will be coming to the end of their natural cycle, something that occurs at
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