SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
The Ford F-150 Lightning pickup had an unconventional test driver back in 2021. It was a day before the electric vehicle’s official release, and to keep details under wraps until then, the big pickup truck was actually cloaked in camouflage. A man wearing aviator sunglasses climbed behind the wheel and took off.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: Mr. President.
PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN: This sucker’s quick.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: How’s it drive?
DETROW: President Biden liked the ride.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
BIDEN: Well, I don’t know if anybody has a stopwatch, but I think we’re going 0 to 60 in about 4.3, 4.4.
DETROW: Early on in his presidency, Biden was making it clear just how much he was betting on electric vehicles.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: Fantastic. All right. Our best test driver ever.
DETROW: A long time car guy – remember those fake Onion articles about Biden working on old hot rods back when he was vice president? – well, he had set big goals of boosting American manufacturing and slashing the country’s greenhouse gas footprint. Shifting the country to electric vehicles would do both. So to show just how serious he was about all of it, Biden took the F-150 for a spin himself after touring Ford’s Rogue Electric Vehicle Center in Dearborn, Mich.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
BIDEN: My name is Joe Biden, and I’m a car guy.
DETROW: Delivering remarks, Biden said that electric was the future of the auto industry, that there was no turning back.
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DETROW: The real question is whether we’ll lead or we’ll fall behind in the race of the future.
DETROW: His administration set the ambitious goal of having half of all new vehicle sales be electric by 2030, and Biden accelerated that goal earlier this year when the White House proposed strict new automobile pollution limits that could require as many as two-thirds of new vehicles sold in…
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