You know who has a big birthday coming next year? And by “who” I mean “what,” because this isn’t a person, like a corporation, but rather a political entity like, um, a prefecture or oblast. But bigger and better! Yes, next year will be the 250th birthday of the United States of America, the country that put people on the moon and crispy fried shells on Oreos. To celebrate this milestone, the Department of Transportation and General Motors have teamed up to make a special set of Stars and Steel edition cars, and the car the Secretary of Transportation chose to feature was, hilariously, the one GM car most famous for not being made of steel.
That’s pretty hilarious to us car geeks, but the campaign does have some positive elements, specifically a push to get people to take more road trips across America, which I think is a good thing just in general.
Still, this is all a little eye-rolly, especially in this video featuring the Corvette, a car that has been famously fiberglass from its inception in 1953:
America is truly the most beautiful country on this planet. And there’s nothing better than exploring this great nation than on the road.
Introducing the Stars and Steel Corvette, celebrating America’s 250th birthday, and @GM’s Explore250 app which maps out all the best places… pic.twitter.com/IEeRhIqnEb
— Secretary Sean Duffy (@SecDuffy) December 15, 2025
You’d think somebody involved with the Stars and Steel campaign would have said “hey, we should either get a car that’s actually made of steel or rename this whole thing to Freedom and Fiberglass, or something.” I mean, GM has plenty of other Stars and Steel options:
Okay, so everything else is a truck of some kind, but still. At least they’re steel! Seriously, though, Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy (who you may remember from the hit show Duffy the Dampire Delayer) should have known better, and, ideally, confirmed the steel or lack thereof with some manner of official Department of Transportation magnet, the same one they use to check for Bondo on official government vehicles.
Now, of course GM is aware of this. In fact, they have a whole disclaimer pop up on the website:
It’s also worth noting that this isn’t the first time GM has gotten into the piggyback on America’s birthday racket; back in 1974, a full two years early, they made a bunch of “Spirit of America” cars, including America’s shame, the Vega! There was also a Nova and an Impala:
There were also rumors of a Spirit of America El Camino, but that has yet to be officially confirmed.
Anyway, the takeaway here is that Corvettes are fiberglass. It’s weird to stick a “Stars and Steel” badge on these!
Top graphic image: GM
I don’t get it. For the Bicentennial, everybody was on the bandwagon: huge celebrations, corporate tie-ins, Captain America’s Bicentennial Battles! For 250, we get derpy flags on a handful of Chevys.
“Stars and Steel” with the grayscale flag in “dark metallic finishes” has certain overtones that “Freedom and Fiberglass” wouldn’t.
Yeah, but not all good ones, except maybe to the Punisher skull crowd.
Sean P. Duffy. Not only does he look weird, but the press release also repeatedly uses his middle name initial. Like his boss. What normal person does that?