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    Specter of Auto Tariffs Spurs Some Car Buyers to Rush Purchases

    “Prices are going to shoot up now,” one shopper said. But some dealers said that economic concerns might be keeping people away.Ziggy Duchnowski spent Saturday morning car shopping along Northern Boulevard in Queens with two goals in mind.He wanted to find a new small car for his wife, and he hoped to strike a deal before the new tariffs that President Trump is imposing on imported cars and trucks affect prices.“The word on the street is prices are going to shoot up now,” said Mr. Duchnowski, 45, a union carpenter who voted for Mr. Trump, holding the hands of his two small children.The tariffs — 25 percent on vehicles and parts produced outside the United States — will have a broad impact on the North American auto industry. They are supposed to go into effect on April 3 and are sure to raise the prices of new cars and trucks.They will also force automakers to adjust their North American manufacturing operations and scramble to find ways to cut costs to offset the tariffs. And for now at least, they are spurring some consumers to buy vehicles before sticker prices jump.Analysts estimate that the tariffs will significantly increase the prices of new vehicles, adding a few thousand dollars for entry-level models to $10,000 or more for high-end cars and trucks. Higher prices for new vehicles are also likely to nudge used-car prices higher.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Trump Auto Tariffs: How Major Car Brands Would Be Affected

    The tariffs on cars and auto parts that President Trump announced on Wednesday will have far-reaching effects on automakers in the United States and abroad.But there will be important differences based on the circumstances of each company.TeslaThe company run by Mr. Trump’s confidant, Elon Musk, makes the cars it sells in the United States in factories in California and Texas. As a result, it is perhaps the least exposed to tariffs.But the company does buy parts from other countries — about a quarter of the components by value in its cars come from abroad, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.In addition, Tesla is struggling with falling sales around the world, in part because Mr. Musk’s political activities and statements have turned off moderate and liberal car buyers. Some countries could seek to retaliate against Mr. Trump’s tariffs by targeting Tesla. A few Canadian provinces have already stopped offering incentives for purchases of Tesla’s electric vehicles.General MotorsThe largest U.S. automaker imports many of its best selling and most profitable cars and trucks, especially from Mexico, where it has several large factories that churn out models like the Chevrolet Silverado. Roughly 40 percent of G.M.’s sales in the United States last year were vehicles assembled abroad. This could make the company vulnerable to the tariffs.But unlike some other automakers, G.M. has posted strong profits in recent years and is considered by analysts to be on good financial footing. That could help it weather the tariffs better than other companies, especially if the import taxes are removed or diluted by Mr. Trump.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Trump and DOGE Create Anxiety but Opportunity for Federal Contractors

    By cutting federal employees, the Trump administration may increase its reliance on firms that take in billions through government contracts.A contracting firm called Leidos took in more than $16 billion in revenue last year, most of it through contracts with federal agencies like the Department of Veterans Affairs.So when the Trump administration’s budget cutters took aim at the V.A. last month, it seemed like bad news not just for the department’s employees but also for Leidos and dozens of other private-sector firms.“No more paying consultants to do things like make Power Point slides and write meeting minutes!” the department’s secretary, Doug Collins, wrote on X. Overall, the department said, it was canceling more than 850 contracts worth nearly $2 billion.But shortly after Mr. Collins’s announcement, the outlook for some of the V.A.’s contractors seemed to brighten. The department put the cancellations on pause, saying it needed to review the contracts to avoid “eliminating any benefits or services” to veterans or V.A. beneficiaries. It later narrowed the list of canceled contracts by a few hundred.And experts on government contracting said cuts to the agency, which announced last week that it was seeking to trim 80,000 of its roughly 480,000 employees, could even lead to increased spending on federal contracts.These experts noted that cutting employees without reining in a government function — like providing health care and benefits to veterans, work in which Leidos plays a key role — typically means the job will fall more heavily on contractors.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Trump’s Tariffs Could Help Tesla, by Hurting Its Rivals More

    The electric car company led by Elon Musk builds all the cars it sells in the United States in California and Texas, shielding it from tariffs that could devastate competitors.As President Trump puts new tariffs on goods from China and threatens a trade war with allies like Mexico and Canada, one global company is likely to suffer less than most of its competitors: Tesla.But the electric car maker led by Elon Musk, which accounts for a third of the billionaire’s wealth, is also vulnerable if relations with China worsen. That country is the company’s second-largest market after the United States and it produces more cars there than anywhere else.Tesla has built largely self-sufficient supply chains in the United States and China, a rarity in a world of interconnected trade. As a result, the tariffs imposed by the Trump administration on Chinese goods, and the continuing threat to put them on Mexican and Canadian products, might help Tesla by hurting its competitors more.Although there is no evidence that Mr. Musk is shaping trade policies, the tariffs are one of several measures adopted by the Trump administration that may benefit Tesla at the expense of its rivals. On Wednesday, Mr. Trump paused 25 percent tariffs on most autos and parts made in Canada and Mexico, but the reprieve expires in a month, leaving automakers in the United States that depend on foreign supply chains in a state of uncertainty.The Tesla factory in Austin, Texas, in 2023. Cars produced here will be shielded from tariffs that will hurt Tesla competitors. Go Nakamura/ReutersThe administration is also trying to eliminate financial support for the construction of fast-charging stations for electric vehicles, a move that could handicap companies seeking to compete with Tesla’s extensive network. And it is attempting to cut or eliminate loans and subsidies that competitors like Ford Motor and Rivian are using to finance electric vehicle and battery factories.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Trump Backers, Including Elon Musk, Clash With Far Right Over Immigrant Workers and H-1B Visas

    A fierce dispute erupted in the president-elect’s camp between immigration hard-liners and tech industry leaders including Elon Musk.Weeks before President-elect Donald J. Trump is to take office, a major rift has emerged among his supporters over immigration and the place of foreign workers in the U.S. labor market.The debate hinges on how much tolerance, if any, the incoming administration should have for skilled immigrants brought into the country on work visas.The schism pits immigration hard-liners against many of the president-elect’s most prominent backers from the technology industry — among them Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, who helped back Mr. Trump’s election efforts with more than a quarter of a billion dollars, and David Sacks, a venture capitalist picked to be czar for artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency policy.The tech industry has long relied on foreign skilled workers to help run its companies, a labor supply that critics say undercuts wages for American citizens.The dispute, which late Thursday exploded online into acrimony, finger-pointing and accusations of censorship, frames a policy quandary for Mr. Trump. The president-elect has in the past expressed a willingness to provide more work visas to skilled workers, but has also promised to close the border, deploy tariffs to create more jobs for American citizens and severely restrict immigration.Laura Loomer, a far-right activist and fervent Trump loyalist, helped set off the altercation earlier this week by criticizing Mr. Trump’s selection of Sriram Krishnan, an Indian American venture capitalist, to be an adviser on artificial intelligence policy. In a post, she said she was concerned that Mr. Krishnan, a naturalized U.S. citizen who was born in India, would have influence on the Trump administration’s immigration policies, and mentioned “third-world invaders.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Tech Makes an Economic Case for Skilled Immigrants. Will Trump Bite?

    Silicon Valley hopes that tech giants like Elon Musk could help to push the incoming Trump administration toward offering more visas to highly skilled foreign workers.Aaron Levie, the chief executive of the cloud software company Box, said he was more hopeful than he had been at any point in the past 15 years that America could soon accept more highly educated immigrants — the sort of skilled foreigners he hires as software engineers.Mr. Levie recently posted on X that America’s immigration policies for high-skilled workers are “not responsive to the market,” and that Elon Musk, with his position in president-elect Donald J. Trump’s orbit, could fix them.“I agree,” Mr. Musk replied. The thread quickly filled with other tech workers and executives sharing stories of trying to get visas for themselves and their employees.Welcoming more high-skilled immigrants is “one of the highest leverage — maybe the highest leverage — thing you could do to make sure that America stays at the forefront,” Mr. Levie said in an interview.The technology industry considers that argument about economic competitiveness as one that could persuade Mr. Trump to allow increased levels of immigration for highly skilled workers. But the industry’s optimism clashes with past experience: The president-elect did not expand skill-based legal immigration during his first term in office. Instead, his immigration officials curbed visa programs for educated workers by overseeing them more stringently.And while some in Silicon Valley and corporate America are hoping that this time will be different, Washington policy analysts, lawyers and visa holders themselves are less certain.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Is Trump More Flexible on China Than His Hawkish Cabinet Picks Suggest?

    President-elect Donald J. Trump is assembling a team of aides bent on confrontation with China. But he also has advisers who do business there, including Elon Musk.They are the new class of cold warriors, guns pointed at China.President-elect Donald J. Trump has chosen cabinet secretaries and a national security adviser who stress the need to confront China across the entire security and economic spectrum: military posture, trade, technology, espionage, human rights and Taiwan.Those choices could open a new era of conflict with a nuclear-armed nation that has the world’s largest standing army and second-largest economy, and where many top officials see the United States as a superpower in decline.Mr. Trump’s hawkish advisers so far include Marco Rubio, a Florida senator named as secretary of state; Michael Waltz, a Florida congressman tapped for national security adviser; and Pete Hegseth, a former Fox News television personality designated to be defense secretary. Cabinet secretaries must be confirmed by the Senate, although Mr. Trump has floated the idea of getting around that by using recess appointments.Those men are more explicitly hostile to China than their counterparts in the Biden administration, though President Biden has taken an aggressive tack with China and continued some of the policies from Mr. Trump’s first term. A consensus has solidified among Democrats and Republicans in Washington that China must be constrained because it is the nation most capable of upending American global dominance.Yet there are signs that Mr. Trump might consider a more moderate approach on trade, perhaps to avoid upsetting a roaring stock market nurtured by Mr. Biden.Mr. Trump with President Xi Jinping of China in Beijing in November 2017. Mr. Trump hosted Mr. Xi at Mar-a-Lago earlier that year, but their budding relationship eventually fell apart over a trade war that Mr. Trump started.Doug Mills/The New York TimesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    How Elon Musk Might Use His Pull With Trump to Help Tesla

    Although Donald Trump has opposed policies that favor electric cars, if he becomes president he could ease regulatory scrutiny of Tesla or protect lucrative credits and subsidies.Former President Donald J. Trump has promised, if he is re-elected, to do away with Biden administration policies that encourage the use and production of electric cars. Yet one of his biggest supporters is Elon Musk, the chief executive of Tesla, which makes nearly half the electric vehicles sold in the United States.Whether or not Mr. Trump would carry out his threats against battery-powered cars and trucks, a second Trump administration could still be good for Tesla and Mr. Musk, auto and political experts say.Mr. Musk has spent more than $75 million to support the Trump campaign and is running a get-out-the-vote effort on the former president’s behalf in Pennsylvania. That will almost surely earn Mr. Musk the kind of access he would need to promote Tesla.But Mr. Musk would also have to confront a big gap between his Washington wish list and Mr. Trump’s agenda.While Mr. Musk rarely acknowledges it, Tesla has collected billions of dollars from programs championed by Democrats like President Biden that Mr. Trump and other Republicans have vowed to dismantle.In Michigan, a battleground state and home to many auto factories, the Trump campaign has run ads that claim that Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, wants to “end all gas-powered cars” — a position that she does not hold.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More