Freedom Fuel gas station opens at Harper Avenue in Detroit with $3.47 regular gas amid federal lawsuit over unpaid fuel

A Freedom Fuel Network gas station opened this week at 17046 Harper Ave. on Detroit’s east side with regular gasoline at $3.47 a gallon, roughly 65 cents below the Metro Detroit average. A federal lawsuit questions whether some of Freedom Fuel Network’s early discounted fuel was never paid for.

The sign at the station near Cadieux and Harper features a bald eagle, stars, and a red, white, and blue logo. The price was $3.47, a nod to Donald Trump’s status as the 47th president. That was about 65 cents below the Metro Detroit average of $4.12 on Wednesday, according to AAA. The three competing gas stations at the Cadieux and Harper intersection were selling regular gas for $4.10 a gallon.

The Detroit location is the first known sign of Freedom Fuel Network in Michigan. Freedom Fuel Network’s website on Wednesday still listed 29 locations, all in Pennsylvania and New Jersey, and did not show the Harper Avenue station. No other Michigan locations could be found on the Freedom Fuel Network map.

Freedom Fuel Network describes itself as a privately owned network of independent stations responding to Trump’s call for lower prices. It began attracting national attention around the Fourth of July, when Trump promoted 25 participating stations in the Philadelphia area that had lowered the price of regular gas to $3.47.

In a July 1 post on Truth Social, Trump wrote that the retailers were taking the lead and that others should follow. He said the stations were lowering prices “because they love the U.S.A.” The White House followed with a promotional video filmed at one of the stations.

Freedom Fuel Network has not provided a detailed explanation of how its stations can consistently sell fuel below nearby competitors. Jeff Lenard, a spokesperson for the National Association of Convenience Stores, told the Associated Press that the original $3.47 promotion probably meant stations were selling gasoline at a loss. Lenard said gas retailers sometimes use short term discounts to draw customers who also buy higher margin food, drinks, cigarettes, and other items inside the store. He said those promotions typically last hours or days. Prices at several of Freedom Fuel Network’s original locations began rising within weeks.

The lawsuit filed last month by Mansfield Oil Co., based in Georgia, claims that New Jersey fuel distributor KRSM Inc. and its president, Syed Kazmi, collected nearly 1.125 million gallons of gasoline worth almost $4 million from a Pennsylvania terminal between May 21 and July 7 and never paid for it.

Carrier records show that several hundred thousand gallons were delivered to at least 10 stations advertised as part of the Freedom Fuel Network, according to the lawsuit. Mansfield alleges in the complaint that KRSM was able to sell fuel at such low prices and attract publicity because KRSM never paid Mansfield for the fuel.

KRSM denies wrongdoing. An attorney for Kazmi described the case as an accounting dispute involving fuel invoices that KRSM says were incorrectly priced. Mansfield acknowledged that a data problem delayed Mansfield’s invoices until early July but alleges that KRSM then rejected Mansfield’s attempts to collect payment.

A federal judge has ordered the defendants to maintain $2.75 million in a bank account while the case proceeds. No court has determined that KRSM failed to pay for the gasoline.

Freedom Fuel Network is not a defendant in the lawsuit. The complaint does not identify how much of the disputed fuel went to participating stations, and there is no evidence that any of it reached the new Detroit station.

Corporate documents show that Freedom Fuel Network was registered in Delaware on June 23. Freedom Fuel Network’s paperwork was signed by Randy Brown, a Baltimore Ravens assistant coach and former Republican mayor in New Jersey, and Yoni Gontownik, a former investment director at energy trader Mercuria.

Companies connected to Kazmi and his brother controlled 14 of Freedom Fuel Network’s original 25 stations. In February, a federal judge ordered companies tied to Kazmi and his brother to pay more than $600,000 after finding the companies had unlawfully obtained more than 230,000 gallons of fuel by exploiting a supplier’s security lapse. In another case, a company connected to Kazmi was held in contempt for failing to remove BP trademarks after the franchise agreement ended.

Freedom Fuel Network’s ownership structure also touches Blue Owl Capital, an investment firm whose subsidiary owned roughly one third of the properties used by the original Freedom Fuel Network locations. Trump reported owning as much as $25 million in Blue Owl stock but later insisted that he had sold almost all of it.