Audi CEO Döllner joins Trump on stage at Georgia campaign rally
Audi chief Gernot Döllner appeared with Donald Trump in Perry, Georgia, to announce a US plant, drawing sharp criticism within Volkswagen and Germany.
This summary was written by AI to complete the context; it is not based on a current source.
On 24 October 2026, Audi chief executive Gernot Döllner appeared alongside Donald Trump at a campaign rally in Perry, a town near Macon in central Georgia. The event was used to present Audi's plan for its first US factory, a roughly $4bn plant expected to build about 200,000 SUVs a year. Döllner thanked Trump for his support and described the project as a long-term investment.
The appearance caused an outcry in Germany. Daniela Cavallo, head of Volkswagen's works council (the employee representative body), criticised it and pointed to internal principles Döllner had signed only months earlier. Politicians called for his resignation, and an online petition gathered more than 100,000 signatures. Döllner defended his decision in a letter to employees.
Audi's supervisory board held an extraordinary meeting on 30 October. It announced no public consequences, and Döllner stayed in office. The episode mattered because it tied one of the German carmaker's largest foreign investments to a partisan US political event, and it exposed tension inside the Volkswagen group.
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