Uptick in Tesla vandalism amid DOGE backlash
Elon Musk’s Teslas are being vandalized at a higher rate as he faces backlash for federal cuts and firings.
WASHINGTON – Donald Trump liked the shiny red car.
“I want the same color,” he said, pointing to a Tesla Model S, before slipping into the driver’s seat.
The car-shopping president didn’t go to a Tesla dealership to make his choice. He turned the White House into a showroom for the electric-car maker, which delivered five models to the presidential mansion and parked them along the driveway that winds around the South Lawn.
But this wasn’t really about a president buying a car. It was a choreographed event aimed at ending the backlash against Tesla and its owner, Elon Musk, who is leading Trump‘s campaign to slash the federal bureaucracy.
Entire federal departments and agencies have been dismantled by Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency, which he leads. Ten of thousands of government workers have been fired, although some have been rehired after court rulings that they were let go illegally.
Angry Americans have reacted with violence and vandalism at Tesla dealerships across the country – setting fires, smashing windshields and painting red X’s on vehicles. Some Tesla car owners have slapped bumper stickers on their vehicles that proclaim: “I Bought This Before We Knew Elon was Crazy!”
Trump and his aides have stepped in to help Musk and Tesla weather the storm and boost the company’s sagging stock, raising questions about the ethics – and the legality – of an administration actively working to benefit a business owned by the president’s biggest financial backer.
“This is unprecedented,” said Richard Painter, who was the White House ethics chief under President George W. Bush. “I’ve never seen the United States government promote a particular company.”
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Musk’s dual roles as private businessman and government cost-cutter also have raised concerns about conflicts of interest.
Musk’s businesses have received billions of dollars in government contracts, loans and tax credits. Through DOGE, Musk has worked to gut or scale back government agencies that have regulated or investigated his companies.
In another intersection of his private business and his work for the government, Musk was to receive a briefing from the Pentagon on Friday on the military’s plan for any war that might break out with China, the New York Times reported. Musk, the chief executive officer of both Tesla and the aerospace company SpaceX, is a supplier to the Pentagon and has financial interests in China.
Trump denied the report, telling reporters he didn’t want to share the Pentagon’s plans with anyone, especially someone with Musk’s business dealings in China.
At Tesla’s South Lawn exhibition last week, Trump stood next to Musk and said the billionaire titan had been targeted unfairly. “He can’t be penalized for being a patriot,” Trump said.
Asked if his decision to purchase a Tesla might improve the company’s stock and sales, Trump said, “I hope it does.”
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick went a step further on Wednesday, urging Americans to buy Tesla stock. “It’s unbelievable that this guy’s stock is this cheap,” he said on Fox News. “It’ll never be this cheap again.” Tesla shares jumped by 5% on Friday but still ended at a loss for the ninth week in a row.
Tesla’s stock plunges by half; is Elon Musk’s EV party over?
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Reuters
The Justice Department also rose to Musk’s defense on Thursday by following through on a threat to prosecute people who vandalize Tesla dealerships. Federal authorities charged three people with allegedly using Molotov cocktails to set Tesla cars and charging stations on fire.
Attorney General Pam Bondi said the arrests were a warning: “If you join this wave of domestic terrorism against Tesla properties,” she said, “the Department of Justice will put you behind bars.”
The White House defended its efforts on behalf of Musk and his company and hit back at Tesla critics like Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, the 2024 Democratic nominee for vice president. Walz told a crowd in Wisconsin on Tuesday that his mood often gets a “boost” from Tesla’s plummeting stock.
“While deranged Democrats like Tim Walz are openly calling for the ruin of an iconic American company that employs tens of thousands of everyday Americans, the Trump administration is committed to unleashing prosperity for all of our companies, industries and workers,” White House spokesman Kush Desai said.
But government watchdogs said the administration’s actions are a clear violation of government ethics rules.
“Use of public office for private gain is prohibited for everyone at the executive branch,” Painter said, citing the Code of Federal Regulations.
“We can argue about whether the president is strictly bound by that, but everyone else is, including the Commerce secretary,” Painter said. “You cannot use your official position to promote any private organization, any company, any nonprofit, anybody. You simply cannot do that.”
Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a nonprofit group that works to expose ethics violations and corruption in government, also said the administration’s efforts on behalf of Musk are alarming.
“It sure appears that the White House is playing favorites and trying to put its thumb on the scales for a business primarily owned and run by a member of the administration,” said Jordan Libowitz, the group’s spokesman.
Biden and the Big Three
Trump’s defenders point out that former President Joe Biden also staged a White House event in 2021 to promote electric vehicles. Biden was joined on the South Lawn by executives from Ford, General Motors and Stellantis, which owns Chrysler, as well as leaders from the United Auto Workers union.
At that event, Biden signed an executive order setting a target for zero-emissions vehicles to account for half of all automobiles sold in the United States by 2030. He then got behind the wheel of an electric Jeep Wrangler Rubicon 4xE and took it for a test drive.
Biden’s short spin down the White House driveway was captured on video and plastered all over social media.
The 2021 Tesla snub
Musk and Telsa were not invited to the Biden event – a snub that reportedly infuriated Musk. The next year, he announced that he was switching his party affiliation from Democrat to Republican.
Biden’s auto show, however, was different from Trump’s, Painter said, because it promoted the use of electric vehicles in general instead of a particular company.
While there have been cases where the government has bailed out specific automakers on the verge of financial collapse – Chrysler in 1979, for example, and both General Motors and Chrysler in 2008 – the executive branch has never boosted a specific company in the same way that Trump and his administration have been promoting Tesla, Painter said.
“Henry Ford never had the support from the government where they promoted his cars,” said Painter, who is now a law professor at the University of Minnesota. “He was all over politics, but they didn’t promote his cars over General Motors. That’s not the American way.”
‘More harm than good’
Trump’s push to prop up Tesla seems to be having the opposite effect, said Daniel Ives, a financial analyst and technology expert with Wedbush Securities, a financial services firm based in Los Angeles.
“It has done more harm than good because the last thing investors want to see is Tesla become a political symbol,” Ives said.
But because of Musk’s work with DOGE and his association with Trump, more people have come to view Tesla as a political symbol, leading to the protests and violence targeting Tesla dealerships and owners, he said.
The political turbulence also is affecting the company’s financial picture.
Tesla stock has lost more than 40% of its value this year. Trump buying a Tesla on the White House South Lawn might be good political theater, Ives wrote in a company report on Wednesday, but it won’t resolve the brand crisis the company is facing.
“There’s only one person who can fix it,” Ives said in an interview. “It’s not Trump. It’s not Lutnick. It’s Musk.”
Musk needs to take a step back from DOGE and start to lead Tesla again, Ives said.
“He’s not a politician,” he said. “He’s CEO of Tesla, as well as a lot of other ventures. And he needs to make sure that the brand damage doesn’t become a permanent.”
Follow Michael Collins on X @mcollinsNEWS.
