On a tip from Ed Kilbane
It came with a turbocharged four-cylinder engine, churned out about 140 horsepower, and made upwards 40 mpg highway. What’s more, the Chevy Cruze was the only compact sedan to come with a presidential seal of approval.
When a prototype of the 2011 model rolled off the assembly line, then President Barack Obama put his signature on the hood writing that the Cruze was “the car of the future.”
But the future lasted only seven years. Responding to slumping sales, General Motors announced plans to push the Cruze out of their showrooms and off of a cliff.
(What rhymes with cliff? Sniff...and I'm getting hints of Solyndra with notes of Fisker and Ener1)
(What rhymes with cliff? Sniff...and I'm getting hints of Solyndra with notes of Fisker and Ener1)
President Obama relentlessly promoted the Chevy Volt, promising to buy one when he left office (he didn’t)— Charlie Spiering (@charliespiering) November 26, 2018
He also autographed a Chevy Cruz describing is as “the car of the future”
GM announced today they will end production for both cars in 2019 pic.twitter.com/qqgR3YdVWW
The Motor City has learned the hard way that what was good for Obama’s green agenda wasn’t good for GM. Fuel efficiency made the Cruze a poster child of that president’s energy legacy. If Detroit could make a car capable of making the round trip between New York City and Washington, D.C. on a single tank of gas (the Cruze comes standard with a 13.7 gallon gas tank and those cities are 220 miles apart), then the automaker could make higher fuel economy standards.
Obama wanted higher Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards, and his administration mandated a 54.5 mpg standard for cars and light-duty trucks by model year 2025. Consumers did not, however, want the Cruze.
Sales were never stellar and more were sold in China than in the United States. And when President Trump reversed the Obama-era fuel standards, sales plummeted even further. Automotive News reports that sales of the Cruze dropped 26 percent through last March. Soon they will free-fall.
A freshened up 2019 Cruze goes on sale in the fall for a final time. Soon after, the plant in Lordstown, Ohio, that makes them will cease production.
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