Kia certainly isn't the first to pull back or cut back on EVs. Dodge did it/is doing it. The truck reversed course, the challenger performance models, scrapped...
i think we had a big run up/scramble with the 2035 initiative. When that got tabled as unfeasible, i think we saw a lot of investment getting pulled back.
Why they would pull a model due to tariffs doesn't really make sense to me. Ev3 Ev4 or Ev6 or ev9, it's still going to hit the same incoming cost. They make the EV6 and EV9 in Georgia, which if i recall if it's built here it's not subject to the same tariffs as a true import.
If it's tariffs, build it here. The infra already exists.
I think the tax credit going away is a bigger thing than tariffs.
It's surprising the imported Niro EV--priced below the US-built EV6 and EV9--is still available in the US. Smaller vehicles typically generate less profit than larger ones and less profitable vehicles that have lost the $7,500 tax credit and which also incur US import tariffs would appear to be a lose-lose-lose proposition. Importing EV4 (or EV3) to the US didn't make a good business case for Kia.