Auto Imports Are Cratering. Thank Tariffs

• Maritime imports of new cars to the U.S. fell sharply over the last year.
• Approximately 3,600 cars were imported to the States in May, a drop of more than 72%.
• Automakers may be holding off imports, hoping to avoid paying Trump’s tariffs should they change in the near future.

It’s been a few months since U.S. President Donald Trump’s enacted his so-called “bipolar tariff regime.” In the near-term, many automakers pledged to keep prices flat for as long as possible. Industry experts predicted that U.S. consumers would begin feel the effects caused by the tariffs by May—and by the looks of the change in overseas vehicle shipping volume, they were right.

According to a report by Automotive News, the volume of maritime auto imports to the U.S. dropped by a whopping 72.3% year-over-year.

In May, importers shipped approximately 3,600 “20-foot equivalent units” (fancy shipping jargon that equates 20-feet of cargo space to about one vehicle) to the U.S. Now, that might seem like a lot, but it’s actually a huge drop-off compared to last year. In fact, it’s a reduction of almost 9,380 vehicles versus May 2024.

It’s not just complete vehicles, either. Shippers are also seeing a reduction in automotive parts and accessories—approximately 15% less volume year-over-year. Interestingly, imports of vehicle bodies and cabs are actually up 18%, possibly because they are becoming part of domestic final assembly as a means to cut back on import tariffs.

Those figures come from Descartes Datamyne, an database that analyzes trends across the trade industry. According to Descartes Systems Group, the parent company behind Datamyne, there’s no other explanation for the dip in shipments other than the tariffs sledgehammer.

“It’s almost impossible to reach any other conclusion than this is the impact of vehicle tariffs manifesting itself in import volumes,” said Jackson Wood, Descartes Systems Group’s director of industry strategy for global trade. “My read on this is that importers are pausing, hoping that more favorable tariff conditions will emerge in the medium term.”

Now that we’ve established that fewer vehicles are being imported into the U.S.—what exactly does this mean for new car buyers, anyway?

For now, not much. But as new vehicle inventories decrease month after month, it’s becoming clear that dealers are chipping through pre-tariff inventory fairly quickly. And once that supply gets low enough, it turns into a seller’s market. Couple scarcity with prices already ticking higher (again, due to tariffs), and new car sales are going to start struggling pretty soon.

We’ve found ourselves in this weird automotive purgatory where automakers aren’t pulling out of the U.S., but new cars—especially new EVs—are no longer the priority. Admittedly, many OEMs are cutting back on new models across the globe and figuring out ways to pinch pennies has become the new focus of companies trying their best to avoid price hikes in a time where vehicle prices continue to rise. But unless they either want to give up on importing vehicles or lose tons of money, automakers are going to have to raise prices sooner rather than later.