They didn’t spend most of that money yet.

This is a story about a program not getting off the ground in two years and then being cancelled by the political opposition. Is two years too slow? You could certainly argue that.

But this really isn’t a story about government incompetence wasting billions of dollars on a handful or charging stations. Money was allocated, but it never had the chance to be spent.

The $500 million that was wasted could have bought the taxpayer 10,000 electric cars. Just ponder on that. Where is the damn money?

You don’t get 1/10 the chargers for 1/10 the money, thats not how projects work. You need to hire people, make a plan, and execute on the plan, and all of that has upfront costs. The same in government as in business — why do you think startups need investors?

That money was wasted when the project was cancelled, not before.