Tesla joins lawsuit against EU over tariffs

Tesla Inc. has followed into the tracks of BMW and a number of Chinese automakers, formally filing a lawsuit against the European Union over allegedly wrongful import fees on Chinese EVs.

The North American electric car brand is actively importing Model 3 sedans from its Gigafactory Shanghai, so it has a vested interest in lifting the fees. While most regular cars are subject to a standard 10% import tariff, EVs from China get slapped with an additional 7.8% fee for a total of 17.8%, cutting into the profits of automakers.

This still isn’t as bad as some other companies have it. For instance, Europe specifically targets SAIC Group in China with a prohibitively high 35.3% import fee. But even so, the industry as a whole will suffer from plummeting profits if these protectionist policies continue to be enforced by the EU.

It’s also worth pointing out that Elon Musk is an outspoken critic of the European government and will do all it takes to oppose its policies. We’ll see how the situation develops.