President Donald Trump signed a pair of executive orders Tuesday that walked back some tariffs for carmakers, removing some levies that Ford, General Motors and others have complained would backfire on U.S. manufacturing by raising the cost of production and squeezing their profits.

The changes will modify Trump’s tariffs so that carmakers who pay a 25% tariff on auto imports are not subject to other levies, for example on steel and aluminum, or on certain imports from Canada and Mexico, according to the orders. However, the rules do not appear to protect automakers from tariffs on steel and aluminum that their suppliers pay and pass on.

Carmakers will also be able to qualify for tariff relief for a proportion of the cost of their imported components, though those benefits will be phased out over the next two years.

Speaking Tuesday before he left the White House, Trump said the administration wanted to help automakers “enjoy this little transition, short-term.”

“If they can’t get parts, we didn’t want to penalize them,” he said.

The decision to reduce the scope of the tariffs is the latest sign that the Trump administration’s decision to impose stiff levies on nearly all trading partners has created challenges and economic uncertainty for American companies. But, even with the concessions announced Tuesday, administration policies will add thousands of dollars to car prices and endanger the financial health of automakers and their suppliers, analysts said.

Trump signed the executive orders Tuesday aboard Air Force One, as he flew to Michigan, home to America’s largest automakers, for a speech marking his 100 days in office.

Automakers respond

Automakers have welcomed any relaxation of tariffs, which they said would raise car prices, cause sales to fall and threaten their financial viability. But the steps will leave in place a 25% tariff on imported vehicles that took effect April 3, and a tariff on auto parts that will take effect on Saturday. That will still raise prices for new and used cars by thousands of dollars and increase the cost of repairs and insurance premiums.

On Tuesday, General Motors abandoned a previous forecast for solid profit growth this year as a result of the uncertainty created by Trump’s trade policies. The carmaker, which sells more vehicles in the United States than any other company, said that any profit prediction would be a “guess.”

“The prior guidance cannot be relied upon,” Paul Jacobson, GM’s chief financial officer, said during a conference call with reporters.

The automaker also postponed a conference call with financial analysts to discuss its first-quarter results, citing the Trump administration’s expected change to tariff policy. The company will now hold the call Thursday.

Details of orders

In one order signed Tuesday, the president said the changes would help reduce the industry’s reliance on foreign manufacturing and encourage companies to expand their domestic production.

For one year, the administration will offer automakers an exemption from its auto parts tariffs for 15% of the manufacturer’s suggested retail price of an automobile assembled in the United States. That would drop to 10% in the second year, beginning on May 1, 2026, and then be eliminated in the third year.

Automakers that assemble cars in the United States will be able to apply for this so-called offset by submitting documentation to the government about their projected imports and tariff costs.

In a second executive order, the president detailed new rules that will exempt companies that pay one kind of tariff from paying others. The president said that when one import was subject to multiple kinds of tariffs, “these tariffs should not all have a cumulative effect (or “stack” on top of one another)” because the resulting tariffs were higher than necessary.

The latest rules also leave in place an exemption for parts imported from Canada and Mexico that comply with a treaty Trump negotiated during his first term. Both countries are major suppliers to the U.S. auto industry.

The exemption buys carmakers some time, said Lenny LaRocca, U.S. automotive industry leader at consulting firm KPMG.