Trump, standing next to Elon Musk, says violence against Tesla is domestic terrorism
As President Donald Trump played Tesla’s influencer-in-chief on the White House’s South Lawn Tuesday, he said he would be open to labeling those who perpetrate violence against the company as domestic terrorists.
Standing next to Elon Musk, the billionaire CEO of Tesla and head of the Department of Government Efficiency, Trump sought to lend his support for the beleaguered company which on Monday saw its stock price plummet 15%, the greatest one-day drop in five years. The federal cost cutting measures undertaken by Musk have spurred "Tesla Takedown" protests, with Tesla owners being harassed and multiple dealerships being vandalized across the nation.
Since December, Tesla stock has plunged by 50%.
Musk, who is categorized as a "special government employee," has made sweeping cuts to the federal government, implemented mass firings and canceled billions of dollars in contracts as the head of DOGE. His work has made him and his company a target of substantial blowback.
“I think he's been treated very unfairly by a very small group of people,” Trump said. “And I just want people to know that he can't be penalized for being a patriot. And he's a great patriot.”
Trump was asked by a reporter as he stood in front of five Tesla vehicles that had been brought to the White House for his perusal, if he would consider labeling those committing violence against Tesla owners and dealerships as “domestic terrorists.”
“I'll do it. I'm going to stop them … because they're harming a great American company,” Trump said. “When you hurt an American company, especially a company like this that supplies so many jobs that others are unable to do.”
House DOGE Subcommittee Chairwoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., on Wednesday announced that she and her committee colleagues had sent a letter to U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi and FBI Director Kash Patel asking for an investigation into the “organized” attacks against Musk, Tesla and the DOGE effort.
Many critics saw Trump's White House salesman turn as inappropriate.
"Just because the corruption plays out in public doesn't mean it's not corruption," wrote Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut on X commenting on a post with a video of Trump getting into a red Tesla with Musk.
Trump, who said he’d previously bought a Tesla vehicle for his granddaughter Kai, picked a red one for himself.
The Trump administration has put the brakes on the federal government's adoption of electric vehicles.
The U.S. General Services Administration has "temporarily suspended" orders of zero-emission vehicles, stopped the installation of new EV charging stations, and ordered some existing stations to be shut down, according to internal memos obtained by National Public Radio and Colorado Public Radio.
During the meeting, Trump hinted at the irony of him hawking the electric vehicle.
“I ended the electric mandate, OK,” he said, adding that at the time he expected Musk to “raise hell” with him.
“And he never called me,” he said. “If I were him, I would have called.”
Swapna Venugopal Ramaswamy is a White House Correspondent for Paste BN. You can follow her on X @SwapnaVenugopal