Tesla Drivers Know You’re Judging Them
There are few more jarring sights in New York City than a Cybertruck. Their sharp corners and general air of menace are at odds with the city’s other, more charming street trash. My friend Ali told me she hates seeing them around. When she spots a Cybertruck, she sticks her arm out and gives the driver an extended thumbs-down as they pass by.
A few years ago, Teslas were a status symbol: sleeker, more expensive, modern-day Priuses with mild sex appeal. Cars that projected, “I want to feel better about polluting the planet, so I’m driving electric.” Without fail, every time I visited Los Angeles pre-2024, beautiful friends with silky blonde hair, Instagram follower counts that ended with a k, and left-leaning politics prompting them to share infographics and GoFundMes to those followers, would pick me up for dinner in their Teslas. In the shotgun seat, they’d let me click around on the screen like we were playing a video game. They’d tell me about their charging ports in their garages at home, and they’d mention how nice it was to not shell out money for the city’s preposterous gas prices. I’d picture them on an average Tuesday, whipping around, dabbing on lip gloss in the rearview mirror, tossing keys to a valet, one of hundreds in a fleet of glimmering pods shimmying along the 405 like silver salmon swimming upstream.
Teslas were on track to become the it car — an entry point into becoming a modern person with places to be. In 2023, over 1.8 million Teslas were delivered in the U.S., a significant number for a country still heavily reliant on gasoline. In those days, just after his acquisition of Twitter, Musk was mostly understood as a zany tech billionaire who wanted to put us all on Mars. Not great, but not quite as easy to pin down. But throughout 2024, Musk cozied his way up to Donald Trump. Despite previously making his disdain for the president known, Musk joined Trump on stage in October of that year in a black “Make America Great Again” cap, doing that infamous jump to consummate his endorsement. Since then, those who had once relished driving their electric cars have learned that status symbols, like a coveted handbag or shoe du jour, are fickle things.
Beth Braunstein, a 66-year-old L.A.-based Tesla driver who works in drug and alcohol recovery, told me the cars were once so popular that other Angelenos got in her Model Y by accident, thinking it was their own. Now, she can’t wait to get rid of it. “As soon as my lease is up, it’s buh-bye,” she said. Her family started leasing the car two years ago after her son totaled their BMW and anticipates turning it in this December. (Most leases, essentially two- to three-year-long car rentals, offer the option to purchase the car after the agreement ends. Braunstein attempted to end the lease sooner, but said it was “ridiculously expensive.”) Even when she chose the car, she thought Musk was an “asshole,” but went with the Tesla because she was offered a deal.
The deal, writ large, has soured. Musk pledged a quarter of a billion dollars toward Trump and his campaign and appointed himself “First Buddy” as well as an “unpaid special government employee” spearheading the unofficial governing organization, DOGE, or the “Department of Government Efficiency.” The advisory board has fired over 2 million federal workers, cut 80 percent of USAID programs, and gutted DEI programs across the country. Braunstein regrets her decision. “I don’t want to have an association with Elon, and I don’t want to give him any money,” she said. She’s so perturbed by the Musk and Trump crony hour, she’s stopped watching the news to avoid seeing them. “It churns my stomach,” she said.
The overall effect of Musk’s policies and personality has turned Teslas from aspirational to odious. He’s cringe to an astonishing degree — allegedly faking his gaming stats, starting beef publicly with his own daughter, and his evident, unending desire to be thought of as cool. As Rebecca Shaw put it in The Guardian, “I have been prepared for evil, for greed, for cruelty, for injustice — but I did not anticipate that the people in power would also be such huge losers.”
“I used to love valeting my car,” said Dominique, an executive based in Chicago and who works in DEI. She asked for her last name to be omitted out of fear of retaliation from the Trump administration. “I wanted to save the planet and buy a responsible car.” Her unease about her car slowly grew along with Musk’s involvement in Trump’s campaign, but hit a peak in March, shortly after the tech CEO wielded a chainsaw onstage at CPAC. One afternoon, leaving a monthly brunch meetup with her close friends, one noticed Dominique’s bright-red Tesla waiting for her. “Oh … that’s your car?” she said, to Dominique. She seemed confused that her friend, whose work is dedicated to advocacy, was driving a MAGA-coded vehicle. “I was like ‘Yes, I know, I know!’” Dominique told me. “I was physically embarrassed and ashamed to get in that car.”
This feeling is resulting in losses for Musk. Tesla’s stock plummeted just after Trump’s inauguration and has failed to fully regain its footing. In March of this year, the company experienced a 23 percent decrease in revenue from the year before and a 65 percent decrease in earnings per share. Several people I know have either sold their Teslas or had family members scramble to sell theirs on account of Musk’s political meddling, and trade-ins are on the rise. “I went to Carvana and Carmax to see what I could get [for my Tesla],” Dominique told me. “Every day, the price was dropping. I was going to be $15,000 to $20,000 upside down. I was like, Oh, gosh, selling it wouldn’t be a smart financial decision.” She feels stuck: lose money, or lose face? At the moment, she plans on keeping the Tesla, but is eagerly test-driving other cars. As for brunch with her friends, she plans on parking around the corner next time.
While there have been actual attacks against cars and dealerships, it’s the everyday, human-to-human interactions that really get to the drivers. Members of the “Tesla Lounge” community on Reddit lament getting yelled at or being flashed printed-out, pointed signs that say “ewww, a tesla.” On TikTok, flipping Teslas and Cybertrucks off is now an everyday practice, practically akin to the “Jeep wave.” Influencers spotted with Cybertrucks, launched in late 2023, popularized through 2024 and nonexempt from the “we didn’t know Musk had bad politics” crop of cars, are catching heat.
Ruby Palmerin, a lifestyle content creator, posted a well-circulated TikTok ceremoniously announcing the unfollowing of one of her favorite influencers. Her crime: purchasing a Cybertruck. “That said a lot about their character. I immediately unfollowed and blocked them. It’s similar to the saying, ‘Why is everything so political?’ It is political,” Palmerin said. “I understand people had Teslas beforehand, and it’s difficult to sell, but getting a Tesla after shows your stance and shows how insensitive you are and out of touch.” Following or even engaging with content creators who own Teslas is now markedly uncool and can be seen a reflection of a consumer’s own politics. For Palmerin, it was better to distance herself from one of her favorite influencers than risk appearing, by the transitive property, a Musk-lover.
Pamela Wurst Ventriti, a liberal content creator so Democrat-pilled that the New York Post alleged she created “fan fiction” about Tim Walz, posted a joint confession and apology to her followers coming out as a Tesla owner. “Some of you guys might unfollow me,” she said. Ventriti then tells the story of how she and her family ended up with a Tesla, including needing to make it to little league, her husband’s commute, and, like Braunstein, being stuck in a lease. She ended with a plea: “Be kind to people on the road with Teslas, okay? We just wanted an affordable electric car!”
As the cars have sunk deeper into shameful, conservative associations today, those in similar boats as Ventriti are putting apologetic or camouflaging stickers on their Teslas. It’s their way of letting people know that their values aren’t those of the chainsaw-wielding, star-jumping Sim and presidential stool pidgeon. Dominique has slapped three stickers on her bumper: “Anti-Elon Tesla Club,” “I Was Just Trying to Save the Planet,” and “Harris-Walz.” Others cover their cars’ logos with black tape or purchase an “I bought this before we knew Elon was crazy” bumper sticker off Trump’s other billionaire buddy’s website, Amazon. Braunstein has an “oyota” sticker on the back of hers, with the Tesla logo acting as the T, to insinuate the car is a Toyota. “People have honked at me and had me roll down the window and ask me where I got the sticker,” she said.
No sticker, tape, or “oyota” camouflage can obscure the hard truth that the Tesla-as-status-symbol has gone rancid. They’ve gone the way of their trendy forefathers across industries — Dolce & Gabbana, Livestrong bands, ordering Papa John’s — on account of the men who make money from them. In addition to the political loggerheads its old devotees find themselves facing, it’s uncomfortable to share something in common with Musk. The car is no longer associated with minimalism and environmental justice, no longer a signal of sound politics and potential marker of empathy, but the personality, fashion sense, and overall wack mien of the person who brought these cars into the world and most represents them. “I’m very much anti-Elon and everything he stands for and represents — his Nazi hat, the way he views his trans daughter, the way he likes to reproduce with women to have control over them financially, and his idiotic stance and support of Trump,” Palmerin said. All politics aside: A Cybertruck “is so bulky and ugly.”