Greed on Wheels, Funded by Your Taxes
You think these corporations care about the planet? Fuck no. Cummins and Navistar are rolling in cash, paying themselves obscene dividends, then strutting into Washington with their grubby hands out for your money to slap a “green” sticker on a truck. It’s grotesque. Cummins alone returned nearly a billion dollars to shareholders in 2024 while quietly scooping up a $7 million DOE grant to throw some hydrogen tech into a Class 8 truck. Taxpayers pay, shareholders party, and the planet gets a pat on the head.
Hydrogen trucks. They call it a “springboard” for sustainability. Bullshit. It’s a PR stunt dressed in engineering jargon. The trucks aren’t going to replace diesel overnight – they’re not even meant to. They’re meant to make Cummins and Navistar look like heroes while the rest of us fund the optics. The average fleet owner doesn’t give a damn about HD45 fuel cell stacks, but they’re funding the theatre.
Meanwhile, Cummins’ dividends keep climbing. Sixteen straight years of increases. Navistar? Struggling to keep a dividend alive, but who cares when the DOE will throw millions at the project to keep the narrative alive. The taxpayer bankrolls their green credentials while these boards gorge themselves. Every report, every press release, smells of calculated virtue. The “innovation” they parade is just a shiny mask over obscene profits.
And don’t get me started on Werner Enterprises’ “test fleet”. Drivers, mechanics, and managers are left to deal with a prototype that’s a proof-of-concept for boardroom optics. Real-world conditions, yes – but only to collect data that will be sold as ESG gold. Meanwhile the real winners are sitting in executive suites counting dividends, sipping champagne while the public foots the bill for their green cosplay.
This is not progress. This is corporate theatre. Billions in profit. Dividends rising. Taxpayer money funding their image campaign. The planet barely gets a nod. It’s a scam dressed in science, polished with PR, shoved down your throat while the board toasts another quarter of obscene returns. Cummins and Navistar have turned sustainability into a performance, and the rest of us are just part of the audience. Is this what we’ve become as a species? Too beat and worn-down to bat an eyelid while these bloodsuckers spend your money? It’s fucking rancid.
Lee Thompson – Founder, The Cummins Accountability Project
Sources