Public EV Charging Was Already Getting Worse. Then Trump Killed Federal Funding

• One in five drivers (20%) has been unable to charge at a public location. This is up from 18% in 2023.
• The perception of bad charging infrastructure is one of the biggest roadblocks to wider EV adoption.
• Without NEVI funding to build more chargers, there could be a cooling of EV demand. 

The last time I spoke with J.D. Power, things looked grim. The auto market is in a weird state of flux, as President Trump’s policies and helter-skelter tariff threats make things very hard to predict. Plus, the likely dismantling of the Inflation Reduction Act will have a chilling effect on the EV market. Because of this, the group predicted that EV growth would stay flat at 9.1% of the total U.S. market, identical to last year’s numbers.

Another 1.3 million new EVs sold in America this year wouldn’t be bad news. But EV charging may be in a worse spot. J.D. Power just released another not-so-good report: “Public EV Charging Experience Continues to Languish as Federal Funds Expected to be Paused, Reduced or Eliminated,” the title claimed. 

Admittedly, this sounds scary. But when I chatted with Brent Gruber, the Executive Director of EV Practice at J.D. Power, to get to the bottom of this, I learned that things may look bad on the surface—but there’s still a glimmer of hope.

It’s an accepted fact that the EV charging experience isn’t all that great, but according to polling from J.D. Power, things have gotten slightly worse. One in five drivers (20%) have been unable to charge at public charging stations, up from 19% in 2024 and 18% in 2023. The issues facing these non-service rendered events are wide-ranging, from the chargers being in disrepair, charging lines being too long, or payment methods not functioning. 

Photo by: J.D. Power

“Public charging availability has been consistently the top rejection reason for EVs for years now; we measure that monthly,”  Gruber said. “And you know, when we look at those people who aren’t interested in EVs, and those rejection reasons that one has stood out because it’s been so incredibly consistent over the years.” 

He said that one of the biggest ways to allay some of those fears is by simply building out more infrastructure. If we had more charging spaces, we’d likely see a rise in EV adoption. 

This goes hand in hand with J.D. Power’s original point: non-Tesla owners who now have Tesla Supercharger access have an improved outlook on charging infrastructure since there are now more options. 

Conversely, the perception of Tesla Supercharging is slipping amongst Tesla owners because now the charging stations are crowded with other vehicles. The “simple” solution here would be to just build more chargers of all types, including more CCS chargers.

Photo by: John Voelcker

This isn’t so easy. The National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) had earmarked $5 billion for a national charging infrastructure, with the goal of at least one charging station every 50 miles. Those funds are suspended, and it’s not clear if they’ll ever return. J.D. Power finger-wags that if more chargers aren’t built, adoption of EVs could seriously be hurt.

“Perception becomes reality for a lot of people,” Gruber said, referring to the fact that, although public charging woes are holding larger EV adoption back, most actual EV owners surveyed don’t necessarily share the same general concerns about EVs in general. EV skeptics may have qualms about charging times, or range anxiety, but Gruber said that the data at J.D. Power shows that most owners don’t necessarily have those issues. 

Most EV drivers will charge at home; even Level 1 charging would be a substantial benefit to cars that sit in areas with long dwell time, that is, when the car is simply sitting there not being used. But Gruber is worried that the perception that EVs aren’t capable or that charging infrastructure is on the brink would hurt more than any loss of funding.

Photo by: InsideEVs

With that in mind, Gruber says that perhaps it’s time to help improve perception by investing in other types of charging stations. “If funding is decreased for chargers, and we know NEVI funding was set aside to install fast chargers, the industry could focus on Level 2 chargers,” he said. I certainly agree.

America’s policymakers and charging companies should be focusing on other avenues of charging, such as public Level 2 charging, workplace charging, and places where it may not be feasible or practical to implement a full DC fast charging station. That’s an expensive, time-consuming process that requires a lot of electricity, when slower chargers are much easier to execute and just as valuable. Just the act of seeing more visible stations in public would go a long way to instilling confidence in EV fence-sitters.

There’s still a silver lining, though. NEVI funding may soon be kaput, but startups like the automaker-funded Ionna could pick up the torch. Either way, Americans need far more stations on the road, and we don’t really care who pays or how they get there.

Contact the author: Kevin.Williams@InsideEVs.com