U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s plan to slap a 25% tax on all imports from Mexico and Canada could strike the bottom lines of U.S. automakers, especially General Motors, and raise prices of SUVs and pickup trucks for U.S. consumers.
GM leads the automakers that export cars from Mexico to North America. The top 10 car manufacturers with Mexican plants collectively built 1.4 million vehicles over the first six months of this year, with 90% heading across the border to U.S. buyers, according to the Mexican auto trade association.
Other Detroit manufacturers will likely also feel the pain: Ford and Stellantis are the top U.S. producers in Mexico after GM, whose shares fell on Tuesday, the day after Trump’s tariff announcement.
GM is expected to import more than 750,000 vehicles from Canada or Mexico this year, with most manufactured south of the border, according to business analytics firm GlobalData.
They include some of GM’s most popular vehicles, including nearly 370,000 Chevy Silverado or GMC Sierra full-sized pickups and nearly 390,000 midsized SUVs.
GM’s Mexican plants also build two of its critical new electric vehicles, battery-powered versions of its Equinox and Blazer SUVs. Those GM models and others are already in the crosshairs of another expected Trump policy: ending a $7,500 EV subsidy, a move first reported by Reuters.