According to custom bike blogger Cyril Huze, Harley-Davidson is going to see $3 million of last year’s EPA fines forgiven.
In August of 2016, Harley-Davidson was slapped with huge penalties, partly for selling Screamin’ Eagle Street Performance Tuner Kits that enabled buyers to skirt Environmental Protection Agency emissions regulations in the US. Although the kits were sold for off-road use only, most customers were not buying them with the intention of taking their Dyna to a track day, and the EPA stepped in. The affair ended with Harley-Davidson not admitting guilt, but agreeing to pay a $12 million civil fine and also sending $3 million towards projects aimed at alleviating air pollution. The project selected was the American Lung Association of the Northeast’s program to reduce woodstove pollution.
There were other allegations by the EPA, but the tuner kits were the main sticking point, and Harley-Davidson stopped selling them immediately after the Feds announced the fine.
Now, Cyril Huze is saying the requirement to pay that $3 million to air pollution reduction projects has been forgiven. Supposedly, the US Department of Justice will announce the decision this week. The comments section of the article has devolved into the usual Republican vs. Democrat bickering one expects with this sort of story, but one commenter says the deal was in place while Obama was in office, so it’s unsure whether or not this is related to President Trump’s attitudes towards environmentalists and industry.
Heaven forbid the gummint doesn’t get their 12 million bucks, but go ahead and let the 3 million bucks for a worthy charity slide. Which is more important after all: More money for the gummint to buy guns and bombs to spread democracy, or the “American Lung Association” actually doing worthy work helping people to breathe?
Sad.