If you’re looking for an interesting upscale electric car, your choices are soon going to get a little bit slimmer. It’s official: The U.S. is banning Polestar starting with the 2027 model year. On Thursday, the company issued a press release titled “Polestar strengthens its focus on Europe following decision under the U.S. Connected Vehicle Rule.” In it, the fate of the marque in the United States of America was announced:
This follows a decision from the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security to not grant Polestar an authorization under the current Connected Vehicle Rule to sell vehicles in the U.S. from model year 2027 onwards.
Ah. Yep, that would be a problem. So, which exact rule is the issue? As the Bureau of Industry and Security—part of the Department of Commerce—states, a rule was made on Jan. 14, 2025 to limit the following regarding vehicles weighing fewer than 10,001 pounds:
Model Year 2027: Prohibits sales of connected vehicles by connected vehicle manufacturers owned by, controlled by, or subject to the jurisdiction or direction of China or Russia, and vehicles using their covered software.
There’s no denying that Polestar is part of the Chinese automotive group Geely, but so are Volvo and Lotus. So why does Polestar have to pack up and leave, but Volvo, owned by the same group and building similar cars on identical platforms, gets to stay and play? Well, it all comes down to the somewhat arbitrary world of waivers.
In May, Volvo issued a press release that went relatively unnoticed. Titled “Volvo Cars receives a specific authorization in the United States under the ICTS Connected Vehicles Rule,” it details how Volvo was able to continue playing ball (we talked about it in TMD that morning). In short, it and other affected automakers had to convince the US Department of Commerce to issue specific authorization letting the cars continue to flow into dealerships. As the marque stated, “The process is carried out on a case-by-case basis, and the issuance of a specific authorization follows constructive discussions with the US Department of Commerce and other US officials regarding Volvo Cars’ governance, technology, and data security.”
Needless to say, something seems weird here given the commonalities between the two marques. Not only do they share platforms, they actually share an American assembly plant. Every Polestar 3 crossover is currently built in Ridgeville, S.C., rolling out of the same factory that builds the Volvo EX90. There’s no word yet on what will happen to the Polestar 3, as it seems to be caught in the lurch. Maybe it’ll end up like the Bricklin SV-1, not officially sold where it’s built.
Mind you, the brand isn’t exactly exiting North America. Existing stock of 2026 model year Polestar 3 and Polestar 4 crossovers will be sold through, the marque has assured continued support for existing owners, and it listed Canada as one of its key markets to focus on in the wake of this situation.
As such, I won’t miss Polestar because they’ll still be around in my neck of the woods, but I do feel for owners and enthusiasts in America. Nature abhors a vacuum, and after Saab packed it in, the establishment of Polestar felt like a natural option for a Swedish marque sitting slightly left-field of Volvo. The big red flag here is the opacity of the situation. The Polestar 3 and Volvo EX90 ride on the same platform, roll out of the same plant, share key technologies, and the marques ultimately share an owner. And yet, one brand is okay to stay on sale while the other isn’t, apparently because Polestar simply wasn’t as persuasive in making its case to the US Department of Commerce and other US officials, rather than failing to adhere to a hard and fast rule that one might paint on a sign and tap. As Polestar has seemingly discovered, bureaucracies gonna bureaucracy.
Top graphic image: Polestar
While some are pretty, and I’m a lifelong Volvo guy (still own two) I’m not likely to be affected personally by this seemingly arbitrary punishment of Polestar, since I’m uninterested in any of the current/near-future offerings from Polestar or Volvo itself. The cars are too complex, reputationally not reliable enough, and (the Volvos anyway) have strayed so far from their founding principles in their aggressive climb upmarket that I can’t. Even. Be. Bothered. about them anymore.
And why TF do cars have to be connected anyway if you don’t want them to? Regardless of whether the company doing the connecting (and siphoning of your personal data for who knows what purposes) is based in China or America, a buyer ought to be able to securely OPT OUT of that sort of info harvesting, and only utilize the connection back to the mothership for necessary software updates, which only should require one-way data transfer FROM the manufacturer TO the car, and not the other way around.
But I’m a cranky curmudgeon who has yet to own a car new enough toeven have a screen in it, so you can just ignore my opinion as that of a crazy old man who is out of touch.
Honestly I’d welcome a completely analog new Chinese car for the US market. Make it so the only “connection” is between you and the road, through the wheel and pedals. No risk of being monitored, no over-the-air updates, no advanced driver-assist features, just a simple car to buy and drive. Wouldn’t that be nice?
Yes, but is such a thing even made? Even the smallest single-seat, often three-wheel, tiny EV ‘grandpa cars’ made in China for their domestic market, along with the zillions of Chang Li-ish vehicles… being ‘analog’ doesn’t seem to be a thing. I mean, some of the commercial tiny EV trucklets seem very basic, without connectivity, but those are along the lines of teh Chang Li, and not anything that mainstream Americans would buy.
I’m not saying there’s nothing like that there, since there are SO many manufacturers and models, but I’m not aware of it. And of course, all their ‘regular’ passenger EVs seem to have a lot of digital crap and connectivity, like most EVs everywhere, including here in America.
It is not a thing as far as I know, but it easily could be, given the industrial powerhouse that is China. Somebody over there could surely whip up an analog car to sell in no time if they saw a market for it. They don’t get to spy on you that way, but they still get to make a buck. They’ll have to redesign whatever they sell for North America to comply with our regulations anyway, so why not design an analog car while they’re at it?
“But I’m a cranky curmudgeon who has yet to own a car new enough to even have a screen in it, so you can just ignore my opinion as that of a crazy old man who is out of touch.”
It’s fucking absurd that this is even a thing and that there are so many stereotypes and judgement these days- but I guess it’s always been like that. Way too many people get into everyone else’s business now. It should be perfectly OK in general to have preferences like this- and it just makes sense! (although common sense is not common anymore ha ha) I completely and thoroughly agree with you though and don’t need/want or care about peanut gallery comments like “oh, well you’re a luddite”…and? so? okay, I’m a luddite…and proud of it! What was your point again? (Not you, ha ha)
Seriously, I am perfectly happy w/ a car being a car and not a connected screen and that should be ok! I don’t want any unnecessary distracting “features”, fancy gadgets and doodads, and a million screens in my …car/vehicle…just make a vehicle a vehicle again, ha ha. Yup, all this BS w/ being connected, getting info and selling it and all that is absurd of course. I will also NEVER buy a new car, and that should be ok! Just adding since I’m ranting that I also have no place to pass judgement on others for buying new if that works for them. Everything has different preferences and what works in their situation. What makes things interesting in general is that everyone has different tastes in cars, music, movies, books, colors, etc etc etc. If everyone was the same it would be so boring; we’d be like robots and just a # but that’s basically what these companies see us as. Anyway, enough ranting; thanks for listening! I’ll see myself out…ha ha
It would be Lotus and Mercedes are on the chopping block next
Very happy polestar 2 owner here… I highly recommend it to anyone looking for a more interesting model 3 alternative. Polestar 2 owners won’t need to worry about service… they made a bunch, and under the skin they are just xc40s.
That said, the last few years have been a disaster for Volvo/Polestar EV models… littered with one-year-only hardware branches, complete architecture redesigns and software bugs galore. I can’t say it’s a huge loss.
The operative question was, does Polestar know anyone close to The Big Guy? World trade is a personal matter now. Maybe “Jyna” put in the good world for Volvo, not Polestar?
Feels like this is the first sign of companies finally deciding that USA is not worth giving a f*** about.
I want to believe all of this madness will go away when common sense once again prevails, and we stuff all the enablers into jail.
I made that decision two years ago.
You guys may be passionate about politics but in business, we cannot have biases and act all high and mighty because “regulations” are strict, unclear, or unfair.
If you sat in a meeting room and despite the evidence of the millions of cars the US sells every year, your reaction is “nah we shouldn’t sell cars there, because politics”; you’d promptly be given the boot while the company rakes in money.
There are non-American brands out there right now that would go bankrupt instantly if they stopped sales in the US.
You’re missing the part that Polestar invested in the US and assembles their vehicles in South Carolina.
What companies are going to do that if they risk getting banned anyways? All your talk about “business decisions” and you miss the obvious financial risk? The US is a big freaking unknown. Businesses don’t like investing in unknowns.
At some point a decision has to be made as to whether the cost is worth the aggravation. As Ferdinand states below, the USA is currently in a massive constant state of uncertainty. If your business can get banned at the whim and fancy of the leader, then that’s a huge risk that not many might want to gamble on.
I read this earlier:
Seems like an important detail. Polestar is basically shrugging it off because the rest of the world isn’t so hostile.
Just disconnect the car 🙂 even though charging might be difficult then.
Also wanted to say as an owner of a 2 hopefully the Rivian R3X comes out soonish or Slate lives long enough to make and AWD/4×4 option.
Rivian’s UI head is an AI stan. He’ll likely ruin it.
Yeah that is main concern with them and their AI comments. I like my vehicles to feel like vehicles not a giant phone. Hence why I got the Polestar 2 over a Tesla.
“regarding vehicles weighing fewer than 10,001 pounds”
oof, so close. Maybe they can toss a few cinder blocks in there to get them up to modern EV weight.
As a P2 owner, I am disappointed but not surprised. The Trump admin has been eagerly putting Polestar through the wringer at every turn.
Who asked for connected cars anyway?
They could just keep building 2026 models until two years after they built the first one, then sell them until they run out of them.
As I understand it National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) roles allow automakers to label a car with a specific model year as long as its physical production falls within a two-calendar-year window.
Of course Carroll Shelby famously tried to stretch that to 50 years or so.
Then of course they could just stop selling connected cars. There’s no reason you couldn’t simply do all the updating and diagnostics using a phone app. A year or so should be plenty of time to switch from connected to a company server to connecting to a phone.
I would much rather have an app updateing car anyway.
Nobody asked for connected cars but they sure as hell do want to shove it down our throats.
Nobody I knew with early Onstar® in GM used or liked it.
I think being able to advertise that your car has over the air updates is another way of saying “don’t worry, we’ll just fix it in post”. If Polestar loses that ability then they risk repeat business because what I’ve read is a lot of their cars had really crappy software issues, some of which has been resolved down the track via OTA updates.
Well software updates are better than the manufacturer realizing that the torque wrenches were miss calibrated for the main bearing caps, or they didn’t heat treat a batch of camshafts.
I would really prefer that it weren’t over the air though. It’s sort of unhygienic,
More bureaucratic nonsense out of DC. I have a Polestar 2 and it very, very much IS a Volvo. Sure there are no visible Volvo badges on outside or inside but take off any single cover and you’re guaranteed to find a Volvo badge stamped on the back of the part. When I need service, I go to a Volvo dealership. When I need parts, I go to the Volvo parts counter. This is entirely stupid.
Yes, but EVs are woke, you know.
This is what happens when stupid people vote.
You know, if this forces them to rebadge their cars and sell them as Volvos, it might actually be good for Volvo. As people have pointed out, next to no one knows what Polestar is in the US. But everyone knows Volvo. People who may never have considered or heard of Polestar would buy one in a heartbeat if it said Volvo on the front. A lot of people want to buy from an established brand, not another startup EV company.
Good point!
My favorite PHEV, The Ford C-Max, might have sold better if it wasn’t named like a medical procedure. What if they had called it what it was, the Ford Focus Wagon?
Just swap badges. Introducing the new Volvo PS2, PS3, and PS4!
*Sony Electronics Inc. would like to know your location*
So their Trump bribe check bounced?
They thought it would cover both brands, but didn’t realize that meant two bribes.
Bribe inflation. It’s a thing.
Geely (Chinese based company)owns a little over 78 percent of the stock in the Volvo car group.
Geely also controls around 14 percent of the voting rights to AB Volvo which owns the heavy equipment side of Volvo (trucks ,heavy equipment ,etc)
They are 2 separate companies .
Industrivarden owns around 29 percent of AB Volvo.
Heres where it gets interesting ,AB Volvo now owns Mack Truck which is where Trump was earlier in the week touting the economy.
So the majority of Mack Truck is now owned by foreign interests.
Although 9th on the list of owners of AB Volvo is the state of Wisconsin with approximately 1.6 percent just ahead of Trump friendly investment firm Blackrock with 1.5 percent.
As much as some people think we can go it all alone we are way more interconnected globally than most people know.
Volvo Trucks had long owned Mack though. When I worked on trucks back in 2014 that was the case. So it was owned by a foreign power over a decade ago.
0% surprised, but most unfortunate for owners.