Meet the Activists Motivated by Hatred of Elon Musk

When Victor Alcala saw that the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, had the Department of Veterans Affairs in its crosshairs, he decided to set up a protest at his local Tesla dealership. On a rare rainy day in Los Angeles in mid-March, Alcala stood outside the Alhambra Tesla showroom holding a sign: “Don’t buy a Swastikar.”  

Alcala, a social worker, interacts with older adults in his daily job. More than 56 million seniors receive Social Security benefit payments each month. For a long time, Republicans and Democrats saw the program as the “third rail of politics,” untouchable because of how many people were dependent on it. As part of DOGE’s efforts under Elon Musk, more than 7,000 jobs in the Social Security Administration will be cut, which Alcala believes will create a negative ripple effect when it comes to caring for senior citizens. 

“I’ve worked with seniors for 25 years. And now that that agency is being hollowed out, we’ll end up seeing missed payments and a total system collapse of Social Security. What happens to all those people that are on social security, that’s their only form of income?” Alcala told The Intercept. 

By protesting in front of the Tesla showroom, he hoped that he could make a small dent in pushing back against the cuts, particularly impacting Musk, who is Tesla’s largest shareholder. “DOGE is an illegal organization. Since he’s taken money out of our pockets, we’re here to take money out of his pocket as well.”

Across the country, hundreds of thousands of people like Alcala have swarmed Tesla showrooms, standing outside weekly to protest Musk and DOGE’s recent efforts to cut different government departments. They range from former public school teachers, to prospective young graduate students, to a 96-year-old woman who once lived under Nazi-occupied Netherlands.

To date, DOGE has been linked to more than 280,000 federal job cuts, including at the Department of Education, Department of Health and Human Services, U.S. Agency for International Development, and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. 

The protesters’ focal point, across age, race, class, and favored cause, is an abiding hatred of Musk— who has quickly shifted from helpful hatchet man to albatross for Donald Trump.

News outlets have reported that Musk may soon step down from his position with DOGE. Trump has increasingly seen the tech executive as a political liability, and Musk’s 130-day status as a “special government employee” will soon expire in May or June. But Tesla’s stock and branding may already have taken a more permanent hit. 

While Tesla’s stock value already dipped over the past year due to weakening sales, Musk’s recent political activities have also hurt the perceived value for shareholders. 

“The protests have worked dramatically well, scaring away consumers that even were considering Teslas,” said Ross Gerber, the chief executive officer of Gerber Kawasaki Wealth and Investment Management in Santa Monica, California. Gerber said that his clients have been asking him to sell their shares of Tesla stock. “It’s still the best EV and it’s a great brand. But now, who wants to drive one?” 

“The value of these protests is not just about people individually no longer buying Teslas. It’s really about rebranding the whole and making it an ‘untouchable’ brand,” said Aaron Vansintjan, a policy manager at Food Secure Canada and co-author of “The Sustainability Class: How to Take Back Our Future from Lifestyle Environmentalists.”

The Intercept spoke to a number of people at protests in Southern California, Massachusetts, and Virginia over the past month. Some only wished to be identified by their first name out of privacy concerns. All were spending their time publicly demonstrating in front of Tesla showrooms.

Here are portraits of just some of the broad coalition coming together to attack Tesla’s bottom line:

GARY THORNTON AND DELIA THORNTON

Gary is an army veteran, serving for eight years in Texas, Japan, and Germany. He also formerly worked in the federal government. 

Why are you protesting Tesla? “We’re here because we’re concerned about the direction of this country. Elon Musk is the hatchet man for our current president. He is unelected, he’s unaccountable, he’s unsupervised, and he’s just wreaking havoc with our country. We believe no one is coming to save us. The courts are glacial. Congress is locked down under Republicans. So, basically, it’s up to the people. It’s up to us to try to stop this thing that’s happening in our country. I served my country for 34 years. It’s horrifying what’s happening to this country, happening to our government.” 

PHILIP

Philip is a tech worker.

Why are you protesting Tesla? “Because PEPFAR got shut down. PEPFAR is the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief. It was a part of USAID and was responsible for essentially providing lifesaving medication for over 20 million people around the world. Because of the various suspension states of USAID, if nothing is done, more people are going to die from this than the Holocaust. [Editor’s Note: Estimates vary on the potential impact of the USAID cuts, but 26 million fewer deaths from AIDS have been attributed to PEPFAR alone over the past 20 years.] About two years ago, I had the opportunity to visit Auschwitz in Poland, and I made this informal promise to myself that if anything like that ever happened again, I would try to do every single thing in my power to not make it happen again. I’m not particularly important. I’m not a politician or whatever, so I’m trying to do every little thing I can do.” 

MICHELLE

Michelle, holding the “Nazi Punk Fuck Off” sign, works in adult education.

Why are you protesting Tesla? “I work in adult education for [the Los Angeles Unified School District] and we get a big part of our funding from the federal government to support adults getting the skills they need so that they can be decently employed through the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act. We do everything from teaching adults who never learned how to read, to teaching students and immigrants who need to learn English. My area is academics: help people finish high school who never got to graduate or pass, and then career training. Calling the Department of Education a waste? That’s insulting to all of us who work in education.  These threats of cutting the Department of Education are directly an existential threat to any of these programs.”

CINDY REVELLE

Cindy works in public education.

Why are you protesting Tesla? “I am personally affected as a public educator and I have family members who rely on Medicaid. I am more globally concerned for people in this country who are going to be affected. I’m also very, very concerned about the ousting of the vaccine expert that just took place. I can’t believe the person who helped us get the Covid-19 vaccine has been forced to resign. To me, that’s unconscionable, and the fact that measles vaccines are being questioned? All of that will affect us.”

MICHAEL NOLA

Michael is a Vietnam War veteran.

Why are you protesting Tesla? “The guy is a liar. He just lies, and he puts these lies out like the Democrats are bringing all these illegal aliens and they’re getting Social Security. But you can’t get Social Security in this country unless you have a Social Security card. And to have a Social Security card, you have to have proof of citizenship. So the people that are here illegally and paying into Social Security are not drawing Social Security when they retire. They don’t get it. They’re actually putting into the system and not the other. 

The Pentagon never passed an audit. The last one they took, they literally could only account for somewhere between 40 percent and 50 percent of their spending. Now, if you’re serious about cutting waste and fraud, wouldn’t you start at the one agency? Clearly they’re not serious about actual waste and actual fraud.

My father killed Nazis in World War II. I won’t buy a car from one.”

SARAH

Sarah works with children with disabilities.

Why are you protesting Tesla? “I am really angry about what’s happened, and I want to make my voice heard and be with other people that feel the same way. I work with direct care staff with adults with developmental disabilities. Cutting Social Security, cutting Health and Human Services, all of that is going to profoundly affect people’s lives. And I think the way that it’s happening is deeply disturbing. This is [some] people’s only income and these kinds of cuts by people who have no understanding of the services that they’re cutting are dangerous. The population that I serve are very scared about their health care and their food and really day-to-day needs, and in the long term, I’m very concerned about funding for the services.”

JACOB AND RYAN

Jacob is an engineer and Ryan is a student and sustainability advocate.

Why are you protesting Tesla? “I’ve been watching this sort of DOGE thing unfold and watching the power that Elon Musk reveals in the government, remembering that I never voted for him, and that nobody ever voted for him. Due process is really important. When somebody has power, it is important that it comes from the consent of the governed, rather than from some decree from an authoritarian controller. Being someone who’s going to be going into physics and grad school, everything does affect me personally. I feel like our democracy is facing some really big challenges right now.” — Jacob

As a sustainability advocate, why are you protesting Tesla? “I used to be a fan of the argument that you should buy a Tesla because, not just for the environmental benefits, but just because it’s a better car. I didn’t care. I wanted to see more people buying electric. But when I see the richest man in the world buying a spot in the government, using the wealth that he accumulated from having like a 50 percent share of the market in the U.S., I don’t think that’s right.” — Ryan

ELIA BEN-ARI

Elia is a retired science writer focused on cancer research.

What DOGE cuts concern you the most? “I’m a former scientist and science journalist, and I worked for the National Institutes of Health for many years. I’m really concerned about what’s happening, what Trump and Musk are doing to science, to scientific research. Directors of institutes at NIH are being either put on administrative leave or told that they are being reassigned. These are people who have years of expertise and training in things like infectious disease research, and now for political reasons, they’re essentially being forced out of their jobs, and funding for research is being cut, especially in HIV research, things like preventing transmission of HIV from mother to unborn child. Why would anybody want to stop supporting research in that area? It’s clearly political.”

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