Check in with Tesla drivers these days and many will tell you: They are in their feelings.
For years, Elon Musk was politically neutral — or even leaned left. Owning a Tesla has been a badge of honor for climate-conscious consumers, many of them liberals. But now that Musk has aligned himself with the conservative right, there has been a definite vibe shift.
You’ve probably seen it on the news.
Across the country, folks are protesting at Tesla showrooms over Musk’s efforts at the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE. As Musk aligns himself more closely with President Trump, people on social media are joking about refusing to let Teslas merge in traffic. In fact, there are whole Reddit threads and online forums dedicated to drivers dealing with “anti-Tesla sentiment.”
Some, like singer Sheryl Crow, have even been driven to publicly ditch their Teslas as an act of protest against Musk.
The Texas Newsroom wanted to know what Tesla and Cybertruck drivers in Texas, home to the company’s HQ and its massive Austin gigafactory, are feeling. So we put out a call on social media. We ended up hearing from Tesla drivers from all over the state.
The general consensus was clear: To a person, everyone said they love their Tesla. But, whether they like Musk or hate him, they said they are being plagued by social pressure, random targeting and, sometimes, deeply personal ethical battles over keeping their cars.
Tesla did not respond to a request for comment.
Jimmy Ogden in Dallas said someone threw Kraft singles at his Tesla.
He said he assumed it was some sort of an "anti-Musk sentiment” and said Musk is alienating the very people originally drawn to his cars: “Fundamentally, the people who have been traditionally buying them are not the people he's making happy now.”
Ogden just bought another electric vehicle from Rivian and plans to sell his Tesla as soon as he can. He hopes he can still offload it.
“If I was more organized, I would have sold this before the inauguration,” he said.
Ammar Khan in Austin said he also believes he was the target of some anti-Tesla hazing.
Earlier this month, he says someone put a flier on his car begging him to reject Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation’s conservative blueprint for the second Trump administration. The message was handwritten in what looked like colored pencil. On the back, it said, “Nothing is impossible. Do not comply in advance.”
“I was so confused,” Khan said.
Khan was gifted his Tesla after his dad decided to upgrade a couple years ago. He said, at the time, taking the free car was a no-brainer. His friends know he doesn’t like Musk, Khan said, but stuff like the flyer made him realize he’s dealing with others who think driving a Tesla means he’s bought into everything Musk now represents.
So, if he had to buy a new car now, would he choose Tesla?
“Hell, no, no, no, no way, never,” Khan said. “I would never consciously put my money toward a Tesla in 2025.”
Some drivers described it as a struggle between the economics and the ethics of the issue. Chris Brown in Rowlett has already sunk about $90,000 into his Tesla.
So, practically, he can’t just dump it — no matter how much he dislikes Elon Musk.
“It is kind of an ethical struggle, right? Like, like, all things being equal, I wish I could, you know, just get rid of it sooner rather than later,” Brown said. “Where I've landed is to say, you know, I'm separating the artists from the art.”
He then added: “I'm not going to buy another one.”
This “artist versus the art” thing came up a lot in our conversations. Nearly everyone The Texas Newsroom talked to said they’ve dumped another product recently because of ethics concerns — like Chick-fil-A or Hobby Lobby if they’re liberal, Target or Bud Light if they’re conservative.
The Tesla debate, they said, is harder.
For some answers, I turned to Dr. Art Markman and Dr. Bob Duke, psychologists on a KUT News podcast called Two Guys on Your Head.
“We live in a world right now where a lot of people feel like they have no agency,” Markman said. “I think one of the reasons why questions like, ‘Should I keep my Tesla?’ are plaguing people is because it's one of the few things that they have some agency, and so this becomes a proxy for all the other things that you wish you had more control.”
They said there’s really no other product like Tesla right now. A car is a major investment. So economically, it’s hard to dump on a whim. And it’s a public commodity, you consume it where everyone can see it.
There are some fixes for people suffering from deep ethical concerns about keeping their Tesla, the doctors said, like taking a serious moral inventory of the pros and cons of keeping the product. Then there’s people solely dealing with peer pressure.
“If you're just worried about what other people think, we'll give them an easy way to think something else,” Duke said. “The bumper stickers are cheap.”
You’ve probably seen them around town. Bumper stickers with sayings like “I bought this before we knew Elon was crazy.” They’ve become a popular way to indicate support for the brand and dislike for its CEO.
Matt Hiller, the guy who makes them, doesn’t have a Tesla. But he saw the market for the stickers emerge a couple years ago, when Musk’s conservative political leanings began to become clearer.
For a long time, Hiller said he averaged around 100 to 200 sticker sales a day.
Then, Musk went on stage at a Trump rally and threw his arm into the air in a gesture that was compared to a Nazi salute.
“I'm sending out 500 a day since the salute,” Hiller said.
People are ordering the stickers from all over the country and the world, he said; the day we spoke he had about 10 orders from Texas. With a day job, Hiller said he and his wife work until 1 or 2 a.m. sometimes to get all their daily orders ready to ship.
“My hopes are that this does not last forever,” Hiller said. “I would love it if these stickers just chilled, you know? And, then, if he wasn't so newsworthy, that would be great.”
It’s hard to know how — and even if — this kind of anti-Tesla sentiment is really hurting Tesla as a brand. Sales were reportedly down in some European markets this year. But Tesla is still the most popular EV brand in the world.
So, perhaps the Tesla fans are the quiet majority?
Hiller said he doesn’t make an “anti-Elon Cybertruck club” sticker. Asked why, he said, “because if someone has a Cybertruck, I am firmly of the belief that they're all in on Elon.”
Matt Holm loves his Cybertruck. In fact, he likes it so much he’s on his second. He also leads the Tesla Owners Club of Austin.
Holm said he is not aware of anyone dropping out of the club over Musk’s newfound political power. Sure, political discussions among members can get spicy once in a while.
But that’s not really what they are really there for: socializing with fellow Tesla and Cybertruck drivers who are invested in the product’s value and the company’s mission. The club hosts events and afterparties to celebrate new releases and factory expansions. Later this year, Holm said they’re taking a caravan down to the SpaceX launch side near Brownsville.
Holm himself sees Musk as a visionary: “I find him the most inspiring person that's got amazing business acumen and is not afraid of any doing, taking on any project, is arguably one of the best minds on the planet.”
West of Fort Worth, Gina Wood said she and her husband liked their first Tesla so much they bought another one. She doesn’t like Elon Musk and what he’s doing with DOGE, but also said she does not see driving one as a political statement.
Plus, they are concerned about the environment and see electric cars as “the way of the future,” Wood said.
“As far as these two Tesla drivers in Parker County, Texas: We're public school advocates, we are Democrats, we're liberal Democrats,” she added. “But we're still driving those cars.”
Then, a few days after we talked, Wood emailed with an update. She and her husband are now talking about opting for a new brand of electric vehicle. What changed their minds?
“Every day the Elon administration gets worse,” she wrote.
The Texas Newsroom is a public radio journalism collaboration that includes NPR, KERA in North Texas, Houston Public Media, KUT in Austin, Texas Public Radio in San Antonio and other stations across the state.