Ford to invest nearly $2 billion in Kentucky assembly plant

Ford Motor Co. will invest nearly $2 billion retooling a Kentucky factory to produce electric vehicles that it says will be more affordable, more profitable to build, and will outcompete rival models.

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The automaker's top executive unveiled the new EV strategy Monday at Ford's Louisville Assembly Plant which, after producing gas-powered vehicles for 70 years, will be converted to manufacture electric vehicles.

"We took a radical approach to solve a very hard challenge: Create affordable vehicles that are breakthrough in every way that matters - design, technology, performance, space and cost of ownership - and do it with American workers," Ford CEO Jim Farley said in a release.

The Big Detroit automakers have continued to transition from internal combustion engines to EV technology even as President Donald Trump's administration unwinds incentives for automakers to go electric. Trump's massive tax and spending law targets EV incentives, including the imminent removal of a credit that saves buyers up to $7,500 on a new electric car.

Yet Farley and other top executives in the auto industry say that electric vehicles are the future and there is no going back.

The first EV to roll off the revamped Louisville assembly line will be a midsize, four-door electric pickup truck in 2027 for domestic and international markets, the company said Monday.