{"id":19643,"date":"2023-04-21T18:52:03","date_gmt":"2023-04-21T18:52:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/ford-defeats-class-action\/"},"modified":"2023-04-21T18:55:18","modified_gmt":"2023-04-21T18:55:18","slug":"ford-defeats-class-action","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/ford-defeats-class-action\/","title":{"rendered":"Ford defeats class action appeal over F-150, Ranger trucks&#8217; fuel economy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>(Reuters) &#8211;     Ford Motor Co on Friday defeated an appeal by consumers who said the automaker cheated on fuel economy tests for its F-150 and Ranger trucks, allowing it to inflate mileage estimates on window stickers.<\/p>\n<p>In a 3-0 decision, the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati said federal law gave the Environmental Protection Agency authority to estimate vehicle fuel economy, preempting the plaintiffs&#8217; state law-based claims.<\/p>\n<p>Ford&#8217;s F-series has been the best-selling American truck for 46 straight years.<\/p>\n<p>The proposed class action covered 2018-2020 model year F-150s, and 2019-2020 model year Rangers.<\/p>\n<p>Ford was accused of misleading the EPA by intentionally miscalculating factors used in certification testing.<\/p>\n<p>The plaintiffs said this led the EPA to overestimate fuel economy by as much as 15%, inducing them to overpay for their trucks and resulting in extra fuel costs.<\/p>\n<p>Circuit Judge Richard Griffin, however, said federal law provided standards for the EPA&#8217;s estimates, and the estimates did not need to be strictly accurate. He also said the EPA had &#8220;significant authority&#8221; to investigate and deter fraud.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;State-law tort claims, like plaintiffs&#8217;, would skew this balance and permit juries to take the EPA&#8217;s place in determining whether fuel economy estimates are reasonable,&#8221; Griffin wrote.<\/p>\n<p>Friday&#8217;s decision upheld a February 2022 ruling by Chief Judge Sean Cox in federal court in Detroit.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;This is a horrible result for consumers,&#8221; Steve Berman, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, said in an email. &#8220;This is dead against Supreme Court precedent that gives states the right to regulate deceptive conduct.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Ford said in a statement it was pleased the court concluded that consumers can rely on the EPA&#8217;s testing process and data.<\/p>\n<p>In February 2021, the Dearborn, Michigan-based automaker said the U.S. Department of Justice had closed a criminal probe into its fuel economy and emissions certification process without taking action.<\/p>\n<p>The case is In re: Ford Motor Co F-150 and Ranger Truck Fuel Economy Marketing and Sales Practices Litigation, 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, No. 22-1245.<\/p>\n<p \/>\n<p> (Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; editing by Jonathan Oatis)<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/ford-defeats-class-action\/a-model-of-the-all-new-ford-f-150-lightning-electric-pickup\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-content\/uploads\/Reuters_Direct_Media\/USOnlineReportBusinessNews\/tagreuters.com2023binary_LYNXMPEJ3K0PA-VIEWIMAGE.jpg\" alt=\"tagreuters.com2023binary_LYNXMPEJ3K0PA-VIEWIMAGE\"><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>(Reuters) &#8211; Ford Motor Co on Friday defeated an appeal by consumers who said the automaker cheated on fuel economy tests for its F-150 and Ranger trucks, allowing it to inflate mileage estimates on window stickers. In a 3-0 decision, the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati said federal law gave the Environmental [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":19644,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1213],"tags":[1223],"class_list":["post-19643","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-u-s-business","tag-updated"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-content\/uploads\/Reuters_Direct_Media\/USOnlineReportBusinessNews\/tagreuters.com2023binary_LYNXMPEJ3K0PA-VIEWIMAGE.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19643","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19643"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19643\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19645,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19643\/revisions\/19645"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19644"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19643"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19643"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19643"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}