The custom 1953 Cadillac Elegante sold for a record $1.4 million at the Kruse Auburn fall sale. Get all the latest auto industry news in the Executive Briefing.
Today’s headlines:
+ “If China wanted to come in and open a plant to build their cars here, I’d be OK with it,” President Donald Trump said to Laura Ingraham of Fox News on The Ingraham Angle. More at The Hill.
+ Ford is investing $1 billion to modernize its Louisville, Kentucky truck plant, its key production site for Super Duty trucks and large SUVs, with the work starting later this year. More at CBT News.
+ Vietnamese EV maker VinFast named chairman Pham Nhat Quan Anh, the eldest son of founder Pham Nhat Vuong, global chief executive as part of its restructuring. More at Reuters.
+ A 10-car pileup on pit road in the NASCAR O’Reilly Series race at World Wide Technology Raceway in St, Louis produced a dangerous moment for multiple pit crew members. More at Autoweek.
+ A survey by iSeeCars.com identified the 25 vehicles most likely to complete 250,000 miles or more, with more than half the list populated by various Toyota-built vehicles. More at Car and Driver.
+ China’s industry ministry unveiled a roadmap of its Five-Year Plan for the automotive industry, targeting 70 percent new energy vehicle (NEV) domestic market penetration by 2030. More at Automotive World.
+ According to a new study from Here Technologies and SBD Automotive, 56 percent of Americans are now considering electric vehicles due to continually rising gasoline prices. More at The Drive.
+ Jeep has introduced the 2027 Wrangler JL-2A, a special-edition Rubicon-based model honoring the 1945 Willys CJ-2A with an exclusive interior and trim for an extra $115. More at Autoblog.
+ The custom 1953 Cadillac Elegante with coachwork by Carrozzeria Motto sold for $1.4 million at the Kruse Auctions Auburn sale, setting a price record for Cadillacs at auction. More at Old Cars.
+ The IndyCar series released its final television numbers for the 2026 season on Fox, reporting a 23 percent increase over 2025 and an average of 1.681 million viewers per race. More at Motorsport.com.
Photo courtesy of Kruse Auctions.
Review the previous MCG Executive Briefing from September 11 here.
Join Mac’s Motor City Garage on Facebook and X to receive notices when every new story is published.
I’d be interested to see an inflation-adjusted study on the rise in cost of electricity vs gasoline since 1972. Although it’s said that gasoline is at an all-time high, it seems like my electric bill has risen faster.
More electric vehicles will necessitate more infrastructure improvements which will drive power higher, whereas refinery costs are closer to mature. The effects of the current conflict are temporary and prices will fall again within the average lifespan of a new car.
Ahhhhh yeessss, the New Energy Vehicle (NEV), the final piece of the American loophole lawyer’s ambulance chasing fraternity paradox falls cleanly into place, joining the connected Electric Vehicle (EV), Battery Electric Vehicle (BEV), Autonomous Vehicle (AV), Neighborhood Electric Vehicle (NEV), Intelligent Internal Combustion Vehicle (IICV), Fuel Cell Electric Vehicle (FCEV), Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle (PHEV), Solar Energy Vehicle (SEV), Wind Energy Vehicle (WEV), Seaweed Energy Vehicle (SEAWEV), Biological Electric Vehicle (Bio-EV), Perpetual Energy Vehicle (PEV), Free Energy Vehicle (FEV), Thermoelectric Vehicle (TEV), Motion Energy Vehicle (MEV), Thought-Propelled Ethereal Vehicle (TPEV), Gravitational Slingshot Commuter (GSC), and Bananatech Organic Conveyance (BORGCON).
Regarding the St. Louis NASCAR oval track IMHO, the current Cup supercar with the retarded diffuser, no throttle response, bizarre shifting 6 times per lap, and the absurdly unsafe pitroad of World Wide Technology Raceway is everything wrong with the global supercar video game mentality of modern NASCAR. No wonder a movie starring Annie Haythaway singlehandedly buying/building a winning Cup team while training a rookie driver for the ’28 Cup Championship seems a good investment and totally plausible now…
NEV is an official term (or rather an agreed-on English translation of an official term) of the Chinese government, not the US one.
Thank you for the context, that helps put it into proper perspective even better IMHO. Please excuse my rant:
The NHTSA’s absurd invisible cloud/OTA controlled EV, AV, robocab and roborig steer-by-wire and safety defect recall loophole cascade/fake safety mandates are based on the old Ohio “loopholapalooza” law school mock trial doctrine of “water flows uphill” nationalized that defies gravity, Mother Nature and COMMON SENSE, built on the Iron Curtain of Sovereign Immunity with FMVSS 555 exemptions, software immunity, voluntary QC standards, noormalized data demolition, self certifications, blah blah blah, and the outbreak of loophole lawyering’s “gentlemen agreements” like the Biden-DeWine-Obama-Kasich ODOT NEPA MOU’s.
When federal, state and local gov’t public servants and USDOT/NHTSA chief legal counsel breaks bread & wink-winks with mr. internet’s imported battery mandates & NDA’s, those people don’t need to coordinate any local tort limits because Ohio-style “loopholapaluza” loophole laywers lockstep together perfectly with ambulance chaser frat bros “loopholegineering” all liability on tax chattle and road users, in Ohio at least.
Illusions satisfy the political selfishness of safety on paper. The confusion ensures that when anything goes wrong, it is impossible to pinpoint any single gov’t employee, contractor or agency fuckup to blame. The exhaustion guarantees that any individual, family or victim harmed who tries to legally hold any bad outcome of the “Ohio law school loopholapalooza” cancer, lukemia & crash tax, speed trap money machine inc. accountable in good faith is financially and emotionally drained before they ever set foot in a courtroom.
Therefore, the Ohio Department of Transportation in Ohio (ODOT) legally treats school buses like garbage trucks in Ohio, rant over…