In Nebraska, President Trump signed an executive order to waive an off-road requirement for the fuel, which is exempt from the federal highway tax.
Page F8From§Eachthe midnight edition — 6 October 2026
Trump's $100-a-fill-up diesel promise lands the same week a lawsuit calls his rollbacks a giveaway.
As it ran on the front
On September 4th, diesel hit $5.85 a gallon, the highest average price on record, a spike the receipts tie to the war the administration opened on Iran. Two and a half weeks later, on September 23rd, the administration was reportedly preparing a 90-day ban on diesel exports from the United States, in an effort to blunt the price hikes from that same war — a supply-side patch for a supply-side wound. Nine days after that, on October 2nd, a coalition of environmental groups filed a federal lawsuit over a different rule the Transportation Department had just finalized, a rollback of fuel-economy standards; the complaint called it a "callous giveaway to Big Oil and Big Auto." That is the vocabulary already sitting in the court file the same week the administration went looking for its next fix at the pump.
On Monday, October 6th, on a stage in Nebraska, the fix arrived: an executive order waiving the off-road requirement on tax-exempt red-dyed diesel, so fuel built for tractors and bulldozers can now run in any truck on the highway. The number attached to it, repeated on the record, is $100 — what the administration says the average trucker will save every time they fill up. The administration also says the order will save farmers money. Analysts quoted the same day said the order would not benefit farmers, who already buy the tax-exempt, red-dyed fuel.…
…(cont) Run the ledger straight. One industry gets a lawsuit, filed four days earlier, calling its newest break a giveaway to Big Oil and Big Auto. Another gets a number, $100, attached to a fuel the war already made the most expensive diesel in American history, a record set on a Friday in September by this administration's own war. The farmers the order is named for do not need the order; the drivers it is sold to are being handed relief from a price their own government set.
Hon, that's not a tax break. That's a receipt with someone else's name whited out and yours typed in over it.
“They blow up the oil market, hand you a $100 coupon for the fuel they made expensive, and call it relief — that's not a tax cut, that's a round trip through your own pocket back to Big Oil's. The lawsuit already has the word for it, giveaway, filed four days before the signature. Watch whose name is on the check when the dust settles, because it ain't the trucker's.”
“Look, this is about farmers and truckers, hardworking Americans getting real relief at the pump — did I say farmers? The analysts say farmers already get this fuel tax-free, so — it's about truckers, then, the $100 is for truckers, that's the number, that's real, that's — why is there a lawsuit about this.”
The receipts
President Trump announced on Monday that his administration will take a series of steps aimed at lowering high diesel costs. The president had been expected to announce a directive aiming to increase the availability of red-dyed diesel. This diesel simply has red dye added to it to signal that it is tax exempt and is...
A coalition of environmental groups filed a lawsuit Friday seeking to block the Trump administration's rollback of fuel efficiency standards, which they called a "giveaway" to the oil and auto industries. Earlier this week, the US Department of Transportation finalized a rule weakening Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards…
President Donald Trump on Monday signed an executive order to ease limits on tax-free red-dyed diesel as fuel prices put pressure on Republican candidates. Trump said the move would save farmers millions of dollars and lower the cost of goods, though analysts said the change would not benefit farmers already using tax-exempt fuel.
Trump signed an executive order intended to help bring down sky-high diesel prices by allowing anyone to purchase tax-exempt “red dye” diesel.
"We've got to get rid of the $19 trillion in debt" - Trump promised it done "over a period of eight years", 31 March 2016 The Washington Post, 31 March 2016 interview
Trump signs executive order mid-rally allowing drivers to use ‘tax-free red-dye diesel’ to lower fuel costsThe president said the average trucker “will save over $100 every time they fill up,” with the order in place.
President Donald Trump signed an executive order on stage at a campaign rally in Nebraska that waives the off-road requirement for tax-exempt red-dyed diesel, which is primarily used in farming and construction. The move is meant to bring down high diesel costs across the country ahead of the midterm elections. “For many years, farm…
· Critics Warn Trump-Backed Diesel Export Ban Could Further Drive US Economy Into the Ground from the morgue, 23 Sep 2026
· 'Trump Did It!': At $5.85 a Gallon, Diesel Price Hits All-Time High in US Thanks to War on Iran from the morgue, 4 Sep 2026
This page is a back-issue: the story as it ran, receipts as they were. The current edition is at the front. The byline is a pen name for a column drafted by a machine and checked by the editor: how this is made.