'This loan program has exceeded expectations'
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Thu May 23, 2013 9:16 AM EDT
Associated Press
Following up on an item from March, President Obama's Republican critics spent a fair amount of time in 2012 condemning the administration's loan to Tesla Motors. In the final months of the race, it was a standard line of attack: the president was recklessly using our money, Mitt Romney said, to "pick losers." Obama was so irresponsible, he even invested in Tesla.
Romney was so fond of the criticism, he even brought it up during one of the debates. Paul Ryan joined in on the fun, condemning Tesla's loan on the stump as well.
Oops.
The taxpayer no longer has to worry about Tesla Motors.Tesla, the maker of electric cars, paid off a $465 million loan on Wednesday that the Energy Department made in 2010. The repayment is a lift to the Obama administration, whose clean-energy loan programs faced criticism after the collapse of Solyndra, the solar panel maker. The company, using money it raised last week in the markets, is repaying the government nine years before its loan was due. [...]Elon Musk, who co-founded and leads Tesla, issued a statement thanking the Energy Department, Congress and taxpayers for the loan. "I hope we did you proud," he said.
Time will tell whether Tesla is able to build a model of sustained success, but at least for now, the rhetoric about the Obama administration's Energy Department loan program picking "losers" appears off the mark. The Obama administration took a chance on an innovative company, and now that company is paying taxpayers back -- ahead of schedule.
And what of the complaints that federal funds shouldn't go to subsidize car companies that cater to the rich? It's not an unreasonable point -- taxpayers helped boost an auto manufacturer selling a product that the typical American consumer cannot afford. But proponents of the loan program would argue, persuasively, that the United States benefits from a burgeoning electric-car manufacturing sector and two administrations of different parties saw value in helping get that sector off the ground. In time, as the industry grows, prices fall, and environmentally-friendly cars will be far more common.
Also note that the right hasn't just complained about this company, but the loan program itself, which Republicans generally supported under the Bush/Cheney administration, only to change their mind after President Obama took office.
It's true that some of the program's investments were more successful than others. It happens. But it's also true that on balance, the program conservatives love to hate is looking pretty good.
"Today's repayment is the latest indication that the Energy Department's portfolio of more than 30 loans is delivering big results for the American economy while costing far less than anticipated," Ernest Moniz, the energy secretary, said in a statement. [...]"Tesla is arguably making the most exciting car in the world today," said [Greg Kats, president of Capital-E, a firm that invests in clean-energy companies], who worked in the Energy Department during the Clinton administration. "This loan program has exceeded expectations."
Fortune's Dan Primack added this morning that there is "now a very real chance" that the Department of Energy loan program "will end up in the black."
