Ford CEO drives

Ford’s chief executive officer Jim Farley was criticised for driving a $30,000 Chinese-made electric sedan which he had specially flown in from Shanghai.
Farley who took over as the Detroit-based carmaker’s CEO in 2020 said that he drives a Xiaomi SU7, which is the first EV created by the Chinese smartphone maker.
Appearing on a podcast recently, he said he did not plan on stopping to drive the car. “I don’t like talking about the competition so much, but I drive the Xiaomi. We flew one from Shanghai to Chicago, and I’ve been driving it for six months now and I don’t want to give it up,” he said.
Taking to X, he shared the reason behind his unusual decision as the boss of one of the most popular car companies in the world. “I try to drive everything we compete against. Have done it my whole career. Specs can tell part of a story, but you’ve got to get behind the wheel to truly understand and beat the competition,” he explained.
However, his decision has not fared well with critics who saw the move as a “slap in the face” of the employees of Ford.
“Jim Farley’s recent admission that he drives a Chinese-made electric vehicle is a slap in the face to the thousands of hardworking employees at Ford Motor Company,” Jason Isaac, head of the American Energy Institute, told National Review.
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Isaac said the Ford is receiving billions of dollars in subsidies from American taxpayers to support EV production in the country. “It is deeply troubling that the company’s chief executive would choose a Chinese product over an American vehicle his own company manufactures,” he said.
The Xiaomi SU7 is unavailable for purchase in the US after the Biden government imposed a 100% tariff on Chinese-made EVs. The Biden administration wanted to prevent US companies from investing in Chinese firms that are suspected of helping China’s military.
In the past, Farley has praised Xiaomi calling it “the Apple of China” and an “industry juggernaut”. “It’s a consumer brand that is much stronger than car companies,” he said.
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