When Toyota announced last year it was expanding its battery plant in Greensboro, North Carolina, the Japanese carmaker hailed the $8bn investment as a sign it was in the electric-vehicle business in the US for the long term.
The facility, which will cost a total of $13.9bn once it is completed next year, is the company’s first dedicated battery plant in North America and will initially employ 3,000 local workers — with plans to expand that to more than 5,000.
But November’s election of Donald Trump, who has criticised electric vehicles and threatened to scrap a tax credit for them enacted by President Joe Biden, has forced Toyota and other auto manufacturers to make a difficult decision: double down, or downsize their US operations.