Joe Biden Paid $89 Million To Boost Electric Motorcycle Production. It's Failing.

LiveWire, an electric motorcycle company, sold just 55 motorcycles in Q2 2025 despite receiving millions of dollars in federal backing.

In 2024, President Joe Biden's Energy Department awarded $1.7 billion in grants to increase domestic manufacturing of electric vehicles (E.V.s), including $89 million to Harley-Davidson to expand its manufacturing plant in Pennsylvania for electric motorcycle production. At the time, Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm claimed the funding would "ensure that our automotive industry stays competitive." Then-Sen. Bob Casey (D–Pa.) championed the grant, with his office declaring that it would "help Harley Davidson make investments necessary to hit its goal of producing more zero-emission motorcycles."

More than a year later, it appears that this funding plan is failing.

Despite the $89 million in government subsidies provided to LiveWire, which was initially launched as part of Harley-Davidson but has since spun off, the company has sold only 55 electric motorcycles in the second quarter of 2025, a 65 percent decline compared to the same quarter in 2024. In the second quarter of 2025, LiveWire's electric motorcycle business yielded $800,000 in revenue. Overall, in the second quarter of 2025, the company generated $5.9 million in consolidated revenue from its electric motorcycles and electric bikes.

LiveWire has operated at a loss since its founding in 2021. After peaking at $46.83 million in 2022, annual revenue has declined for two consecutive years, dropping 43 percent from the company's peak year in 2022. The company has never had a profitable quarter, a trend that is expected to continue through 2025.

While it's projected sales of up to 3,000 electric motorcycles over the past two years, LiveWire has sold only 2,418 electric motorcycles since its inception in 2021. Last year, the company sold just 612 motorcycles, falling short of its 2023 sales of 660 machines and well below its initial 2024 projection of 1,000 to 1,500 bikes. Despite a history of missing sales targets, LiveWire again projected sales of 1,000 to 1,500 electric motorcycles for 2025.

A significant appeal of gas-powered motorcycles lies in the owner's ability to customize their bike. By design, electric motorcycles are quiet and difficult to modify.

Although the upfront cost of LiveWire electric motorcycles is significantly lower than most new Harley-Davidson gasoline models, LiveWire's financials suggest that the market has clearly expressed its preference. The $89 million grant to Harley-Davidson is only one in a long list of failed, costly green energy projects funded by the Biden administration, which also includes a $9.63 billion loan to Ford to build three manufacturing plants for the company's E.V. batteries in Tennessee and Kentucky. Only one of these factories has been built—and has yet to roll out batteries—while the other two have no set opening date.

In May, amid a continued decline in sales, Harley-Davidson suspended its full-year financial forecast due to the imposition of President Donald Trump's tariffs. If the company's second-quarter financial outlook is any indication of future performance, there will be little relief to come. In the second quarter of 2025, Harley-Davidson's revenue dropped 19 percent year-over-year, with global motorcycle shipments down 28 percent. To date, tariffs have cost the company $17 million in 2025.

Like many other projects before it, government funding has not helped LiveWire turn a profit. It has instead artificially prolonged its financial runway and potentially discouraged disruptive thinking and entrepreneurial spirit.

Comments

[sarcasmic]

The narrative says Democrat Reason never criticizes Biden. Either the narrative is a lie or this article doesn’t exist. So obviously that means the article doesn’t exist.

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

Cite? I mean besides your past strawman usage.

Continue to find it funny you say you always criticize democrats yet even here you are unable to.

[Rick James]

Reason search function:

for the guy who was president for 4 years, in the senate for nearly 50, vice president for 8, who presided over the executive branch during one of the most volatile times in American history, whose administration presided over one of the most vast censorship regimes of the modern era-- so vast it's been called "the censorship industrial complex" and whose administration was the centerpiece of one of the greatest presidential scandals in American history:

Showing 25 of 7651 results found for: biden

for the guy who entered politics in 2015, was president for 4 years, not president for the following 4 and has only been president for a year in his second term:

Showing 25 of 19593 results found for: trump

As former Reason alum Michael Moynihan said of MSNBC during Biden's presidency: You'd be forgiven if you didn't know Biden was president.

[sarcasmic]

One thing that never occurs to Trump defenders is that Trump tries to stay in the news. He's an attention whore. He tries to grab headlines whenever he possibly can. He's been like that since the 80s. Once he ran for president he kept himself in the news. While in office he kept himself in the news. While Biden was president he was always spouting off about something so he could get in the news. And the saga continues. His goal is to overwhelm the news cycles with so much bullshit that people can only keep track of a fraction of what he is doing. So it is no surprise that there were two and a half times as many stories about him than about Biden. Especially since he's been media whoring for twice as many years as Biden was in office. Yet you and the rest of his defenders see more stories about him and you scream "TDS!" because it has never once occurred to you that it was by his own design. And it never will. Because you only care about attacking the media and shouting TDS like a brainless sycophant.

[Sir Chips Alot]

so Trump forced all your far left fake news propaganda networks to cover him non stop?

giggles

[sarcasmic]

Retarded retards are retarded.

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

Finally self awareness for sarc.

[Don't look at me! ( Is the war over yet?)]

Biden was a complete failure. Deal with it.

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

We scream TDS because you're a Maddow watching liberal suffering from TDS. This rant of yours right here proves it.

[car-keynes]

I think it to be about consumer memory & media exposures that ultimately amount to free publicity.

Wanting to be remembered for your public acts were generally a good thing -- because usually criminals tend to have very brief public spotlights -- and many criminals do not actively seek to be publicized.

[JohnZ]

Joe Biden didn't know Biden was president.
P/S NBC is ditching MSNBC like a bad case of STD.
Much like CBS is tossing that loser Colbert.
I see Howard Stern is finished.
Up next: Jimmy Kimmel and John Stewart-Lieberman
LOL!

[GOD OF PENGUIN ISLAND]

Poor stupid sarcbot.

[Chumby]

Govt money used to fund green initiatives, green initiatives fail. Govt money waste. Rise, repeat. It is a viscous cycle.

[Gaear Grimsrud]

The right people got paid. What's so terrible about that?

[Chumby]

They were pedaling something.

[Don't look at me! ( Is the war over yet?)]

It’s a vicious cycle.

[JohnZ]

10% for the big guy!

[Longtobefree]

So it was 8.9 million for the big guy?

[Rick James]

How do you do my fellow kids... isn't this electric motorcycle thing like... the worst?

From 4 years ago.

[mad.casual]

the electric motorcycles that actually sell are cheap small and rideable with a regular driver's license something they've already figured out in china and the denser parts of europe

Of course it also helps that those places have also removed car parking, banned small engines, restricted access to larger vehicles, and 'managed' the disposal of millions of cheap electric bikes and perfectly functional, but old and therefore illegal, ICE bikes... because EVs are just really popular. And still something like 90+% of the riders in these places cling to their gas engines.

I've been saying for years that if EV motorcycles weren't otherwise so resource/cost intensive up front they would otherwise kill in those markets; quiet, no emissions, low maintenance, sufficient range, sufficient capacity, adequate speed, low (enough) charge times. Instead, for years, children's ebikes have been outselling electric motorcycles. It's like the "meat substitutes" that struggle to compete with chicken nuggets.

[JohnZ]

In New York City in 2023 more than 200 fires destroyed apartments and homes also causing the deaths of several people. These fires ignited from cheap, defective battery packs and poor charging techniques.
Anyone who owns one of these electric motorcycles needs to park then in another building, preferably one they won't lose too much money on when it burns up.
Lithium batteries pack a much more powerful current punch than normal lead acid or Nicad packs. Additionally, they create their own oxygen supply which makes it extremely difficult to put out the fires they cause.

[diver64]

They are not popular for one simple reason. People who buy a Harley want them to sound like a Harley not a Tesla.

[mad.casual]

Disagree. It's pretty straight up range and utility. Per my point, even in places where "Harley Culture" isn't a thing, they aren't (as) popular and still require subsidies/primary and secondary market manipulations to achieve something that begins to approach 10-20% of the market share. From the other side, Indian, BMW, and various Japanese motorcycle manufacturers are able to compete with Harley on American soil. It's largely range/utility, purchase price, and operating cost.

i.e. American golf courses have no specific requirements to get rid of or adopt ICE or electric golf carts. Nobody is buying Harley Davidson golf carts because of the Harley Davidson golf cart legacy or the roar of a Harley golf cart motor. With lower maintenance and quieter operations, electric golf carts account for something like 80+% of the new sales. More than 4X the market penetration of ebikes virtually anywhere. If you "jump" from golf carts to ATV/UTVs where range, affordability, and utility are prioritized over silence/Harley Davidson roar and low(er) maintenance, the proportion flips back to what's seen for ebikes.

The Harley Davidson and American motor culture are still (barely) a thing, but EVs are fundamentally more costly and/or less useful than ICEs and it's, for a while, been more successful to convince or mandate people to give up the convenience of ICEs (and walk a round of golf and leave their car parked at home) rather than improve EVs.

[Johnf63]

This. An article about the 2025 LiveWire One on totalmotorcycle.com says highway range is 70 miles. Of course YMMV so you wouldn't want to go more than 50 miles without stopping for an hour to charge. You'd spend more time charging than riding. It wouldn't be bad for riding around town, but then it's competing with smaller gas-powered bikes and it costs 3 or 4 times as much as those. Finally, it's relatively heavy at 562 and it looks like the batteries are pretty high up in the frame, so I suspect it's quite difficult to pick up if you drop it.

[Homer Thompson]

no mention of what happened to the CEO who tried to bring this electric turd to market

no mention of the EU 55% tariff threat in 2021

this reporting is absolutely abysmal

https://www.cyclenews.com/2025/04/article/harley-davidson-ceo-jochen-zeitz-retires-after-five-years-with-the-brand/

[Homer Thompson]

this is a woke business catastrophe to rival bud light

[car-keynes]

But have you ever tried to light a torch with light beer?

[TJJ2000]

Of course it failed.
WTF would be the purpose of using 'GUNS' (Gov-Guns) for-it if it wasn't a failure?
If it was worth-while it wouldn't need 'Guns' used in the transaction.

It's amazing how dumb Americans are getting.

NEWS ALERT. Gun-Robbers took money from the bank but returned nothing. Contrary to their promises to return it all plus a ?free? pony.

[Uncle Jay]

It's called redistribution of the wealth.
You will never get any of the money, but be satisfied to know it all went to a good cause.

[Uncle Jay]

Electric motorcycles?
What other wonderful ideas does the left have for us?
Electric ice skates?

[Eeyore]

Electric powered backup emergency generators.

[Sevo, 5-30-24, embarrassment]

We were running a vintage race car at Laguna Seca and needed power for a soldering iron. Had a Honda gen-set, but it was very quiet. A guy who certainly should have known better came by and asked if the generator was electrically powered.
I was truly dumb-struck, and no one in the crew laughed.

[Chumby]

They are called batteries and those off-grid using solar rely on them through their inverters for power at night and during cloud cover.

I believe some of the Ecoflow inverters come with an integrated battery.

[diver64]

Indeed. They call them "solar generators" for marketing but they are nothing but rechargeable batteries. This is not a knock as they work quite well for their purpose. I have a small one that recharges from a portable 100W solar panel. I use it at my hunting camp which is miles from a paved road and power. It charges my Nook, phone, flashlight etc and does it well.

[Ron]

I wouldn't mind an electric motorcycle but they are twice the cost of a gas powered bike so why buy. Just in case anyone ask no they should not be subsidized to make it more affordable, no company should ever be subsidized for any reason ever and no NGO or news station should ever be subsidized.

[Ron]

note I might buy and electric bicycle those are within reason and not subsidized

[Eeyore]

They are not cheap at all. The electric bike that would fit my use case is 13k.

[Gaear Grimsrud]

I feel like an AI generated Peter Fonda marketing campaign could save the EV hog.

[Stupid Government Tricks]

I don't buy this.

A significant appeal of gas-powered motorcycles lies in the owner's ability to customize their bike. By design, electric motorcycles are quiet and difficult to modify.

I have never driven a motorcyle. But I have severe doubts that customizability is a significant attraction of gas-powered motorcycles over EV bikes. More like it's being gas-powered and able to refuel in minutes. You know ... same as with cars.

[Incunabulum]

Yeah, as a rider myself, there's a lot you can do to a bike - but its cosmetic stuff, or aftermarket brakes, suspension parts, stuff like that.

The most most people would do with the engine is replace the exhaust and apply a more aggressive tune. Both are to increase torque/HP. Electric bikes already get a pretty good amount of torque to the wheels, do all through the speed range (without needing gears), and I can't imagine you couldn't do a software tweek to the power delivery software to increase that to the hardware limits. Tunes nowadays are also just software tweeks to the throttle map.

Only racers generally get into modifying the engine directly - and you can do the equivalent on the bike. Its just instead of replacing cams or pistons you're buying a more powerful hub motor, changing the battery, or changing the power delivery hardware.

[mad.casual]

I can't imagine you couldn't do a software tweek to the power delivery software to increase that to the hardware limits.

The fact that you assume there's software involved and that it specifically facilitates ease-of-tweaking is... interesting.

[Ron]

software is involved on electric vehicles, so much so that many brands charge extra for more miles per charge or more power

[Incunabulum]

Software is involved. There hasn't been a single new production vehicle of any type that isn't run off of a computer for at least 20 years.

And I did not say it 'specifically facilitates ease of tweeking' - modifying software is easier to do at home than .modifying hardware. You just need an interface cable and a computer at the core.

[mad.casual]

Now you're just stumbling over yourself.

There hasn't been a single new production vehicle of any type that isn't run off of a computer for at least 20 years.

Huh? Maybe you aren't in the same mental frame I'm in. Electric mini bikes have outsold Livewires for years. Various models of Kei Trucks, to this day, roll off the line without a single microprocessor on their base models. I don't think it would be too hard to find a new dirt bike or snowmobile that's pure electro-mechanical. All kinds of foreign ebikes or electric scooters have no computer controls and only employ microcontrollers for sensory and other non-motor functions like measuring speed and disengaging the ignition.

Computer use in new production vehicles aside, is "instead of replacing cams or pistons you're buying a more powerful hub motor, changing the battery, or changing the power delivery hardware." something I can do at home the way Harley owners 30 yrs. ago used to do in their driveway with used parts or am I going to have to get a laptop and set up my JTAG/UART breakout board and maybe attain a software license or two first?

Lemme ask another way, have you personally replaced the motor or battery on a Harley Davidson Livewire or "production vehicle of any type that isn't run off a computer" and "done a software tweek to the power delivery software to increase that to the hardware limits" or no? I ask as someone who has more than once assumed and/or been told "It's just a minor software tweak." to support the hardware (typically more for radios and SDR) only to discover that the tweak involves cracking locked boot processes, deciphering proprietary encoding schemes (or using vaporware that supposedly does it automagically), and flashing new firmware even though the hardware swap was both more expensive *and* as simple as changing a handful of screws and connecting 2-4 wires. Because, even taking the "tweaking" in good faith it still feels and sounds a bit like the custom car/bike Youtube channel bit where they build/modify a custom car in 48 hours or whatever and it runs just long enough for them to finish shooting and then dies.

[TJJ2000]

The weight-to-hp ratio between batteries and fuel is quite significant.
You do loose a lot of preference options (i.e. what is possible) with EV.

[mad.casual]

I have never driven a motorcyle. But I have severe doubts that customizability is a significant attraction of gas-powered motorcycles over EV bikes.

[Tilts hand] I think this is more a reflection or statement about a symptom of a diseased ecosystem vs. ownership culture rather than the specific custom options available for any given bike.

[car-keynes]

The most likely to succeed EV battery would be completely modular and everlastingly rechargeable so that people won't have to wait to charge or even to refuel. The component would be swapped out in the fastest of ways while the EV validates the promised amount of energy being on-hand and accessible.

If you need it to sound like a gas-powered vehicle, add surround sound speakers and plug it into the CPU gateway.

[TJJ2000]

"If you need it to sound like a gas-powered vehicle" ... "being completely modular and everlastingly rechargeable so that people won't have to wait to charge" ... "component would be swapped out in the fastest of ways" ... "promised amount of energy being on-hand and accessible"

Then you just use gas instead of a battery.

Anyone who can't decipher that EV'S are all about Government getting full control of the "the peoples" energy resources isn't very bright.

[CE]

There are two lies in the article's title.

Biden didn't "pay" anything -- he borrowed another 89M on the taxpayers' tab.

And it wasn't to boost electric motorcycle production -- it was to line the pockets of a few supporters, and to make it look like he was doing it "for the environment," so other supporters would vote for him.

[Sevo, 5-30-24, embarrassment]

^+1

[JohnZ]

The same can be said concerning USAID and every other program ladened with money. It all end up in the pockets of certain individuals and liberal NGOs.
Liberal will defend Biden until hell freezes over though.

[Incunabulum]

Of course, none of this is corruption and not state-direction of industry - therefore it can't possibly be incipient fascism.

[JohnZ]

Summertime in Michigan means masses of people heading north for vacations. The massive number of bikers I see every summer are 98% Harleys. The small percentage are crotch rockets being ridden by 18 year olds attempting to break land speed records.
As for the $89 million, well you can forget about it as it has all drifted into the hands and bank accounts of various grifters and liberal NGOs who finance rioters and doxx ICE agents.
Not forgetting the 10% for the big guy.
California recently raised $100 million for fire relief and it all simply floated away into the atmosphere of NGOs who use the money to hire rent-a-mobs.
And Newsom has the gall to label Trump as an incompetent failure.

[Jerry B.]

Who would want a quiet Harley?

[Truthteller1]

The biggest grift in history.

[Max Rocketanski]

"Although the upfront cost of LiveWire electric motorcycles is significantly lower than most new Harley-Davidson gasoline models..."

That is kind of like saying you are the world's tallest midget.

'Most' Harely-Davidson models are full sized cruisers with fairings and bags (i.e. 'big boy bikes) and cost around $25,000+. The LiveWire bikes are smaller, yet still cost around $15,000. A comparable metric ICE bike would cost $5,000 to $8,000.

[car-keynes]

Democrats will waste copious amounts of money on things that are not technically safe to buy. It could had been e-bicycles but was electric motorcycles, which I have only ridden as a passenger prior to the age of consent.

Artistically, and consonant with my theory that all unwanted spending amounts to support given to the Arts, this puts more motorcycles on the road and helps protect people who chose to buy little rides of this sort.