Waste from coal powered electricity isn't emitted by every consumer in populated areas. It's emitted in a plant which
a) generally has more advanced particular matter capture technology &
b) to reduce emission further, only the place emitting the emissions needs to be upgraded(not the vehicle of every end consumer of that energy) &
c) is more readily replaceable by a cleaner source with minimal disruption.
Look at what happened in France when the government changed its mind on which carburant is cleaner and tried to force millions of consumer via taxes.
Also, keep in mind that China is trying to get cleaner electricity as shown by the giant damns they are building.
In Northern California, you are looking at 0 to 30% of electricity coming from fossil fuels, of which is almost entirely natural gas. An EV in NorCal is almost certainly polluting a lot less than an ICE car.
This is sadly not really true, especially in China, the biggest electric vehicle market, where most of the electricity is coal-generated. You end up with a car requiring more energy (e.g. more fossil fuels) to produce AND to run.
The situation is not very pretty in the USA yet either, but if you are hopeful in the next decade that the USA will decarbonate their electricity, then maybe you will get a positive return on GHG emissions over your car lifetime.
Electric cars as a means to reduce GHG emissions todaly only make real sense in specific countries with a low-emissions electricity profile, such as France and northern Europe (Sweden etc).