Do you have a general source? I know in many places it's the dealerships themselves contributing to some PAC that advocates for banning it, eg. Oklahoma HB 3994, but I haven't heard of Ford directly doing this. If anything, Ford has locked themselves into the dealership model via historically partnering with them, so now and forever they have to share profit margin with them while Tesla is able to enjoy the full 29% of their automotive gross margins[0].
In the United States, direct manufacturer auto sales are prohibited in many states by franchise laws requiring that new cars be sold only by independent dealers [1].
This source provides some historical context as to where the franchise laws originated from, albeit, I cannot find anything that directly links Ford to my original assertion [2].
The National Automobile Dealers Association (NADA) is responsible for representing 16,500 dealerships across the nation. While NADA abstracts away the ties between dealers and automakers, the vast majority of NADA participants are the legacy/typical automakers [3].
Those franchise laws were written by and lobbied for by the dealership associations in direct response to Ford and GM dabbling in company-owned stores in the 1990s. They were not pushed for by Ford but against Ford, to make it illegal for Ford to directly compete with its franchisees.
> the vast majority of NADA participants are the legacy/typical automakers
I don’t see where in [3] this is supported. NADA is an association of dealerships not auto makers. I think there might be some confusion between say Ford the auto manufacturer and a franchise Ford dealership.
0: https://tesla-cdn.thron.com/static/WIIG2L_TSLA_Q4_2021_Updat...