2026 Dodge Hornet Production Delayed Due to Trump’s Import Tariffs
Dodge is suspending production of the 2026 Hornet, which is assembled in Italy alongside the Alfa Romeo Tonale, as it weighs the impact of import tariffs.
Production of the 2026 Dodge Hornet is being postponed, as first reported by Automotive News and confirmed to Car and Driver by Stellantis.
The Hornet, including the Hornet Hybrid, is built in Italy alongside the Alfa Romeo Tonale and therefore hit with a 25 percent import tariff.
Dodge wouldn’t confirm whether any 2026 Hornets will be built or if the compact SUV will skip the 2026 model year.
Things aren’t looking great for the Dodge Hornet. The compact SUV, which arrived for the 2023 model year, managed to move 20,559 units in 2024, but sales took a nosedive in the second quarter of this year. Now, it seems that the Hornet’s future is up in the air. Dodge is delaying production of the 2026 model as a result of the Trump administration’s recently imposed tariffs on imported cars, as first reported by Automotive News.
A Stellantis spokesperson confirmed the postponement to Car and Driver, stating that production of the Dodge Hornet “is postponed for the 2026 model year as we continue to assess the effects of U.S. tariff policies.” The Hornet is currently built at a factory in Pomigliano d’Arco, Italy, alongside the mechanically related Alfa Romeo Tonale, and is therefore subject to a 25 percent import tariff.
2025 dodge hornet hybrid rearView Photos
Marc Urbano
Stellantis did not confirm whether this meant that the Hornet would skip the 2026 model year entirely or if there is a possibility that a run of 2026 Hornets will be assembled later. Dodge sold 4108 Hornets in the first quarter of this year, down from 7419 in the first quarter of 2024. But sales really suffered in the second quarter, with just 1539 Hornets finding homes, down 64 percent from the same period the year before, when Dodge sold 4299 Hornets.
Through the first half of this year, Hornet sales are down 52 percent year-over-year, although it is still the second-bestselling Dodge, as the electric Charger Daytona has struggled to take off; the Challenger was discontinued after 2023, and the gas-powered Charger Sixpack has yet to arrive to replace the previous combustion-engined Charger. The Hornet also isn’t the first Dodge to face tariff-related challenges, with Dodge reducing the Charger Daytona lineup to just the Scat Pack, dropping the base R/T model for 2026 as sales of the Canada-built electric muscle car remain slow.
