Elon Musk is turning US liberals off not just Tesla but electric vehicles in general

The Guardian

4 days ago

US liberals have become so disgusted with Tesla since Elon Musk's rightward turn that they are now not only far less likely to purchase the car brand but also less willing to buy any type of electric car, new research has found.
The popularity of Tesla among liberal-minded Americans has plummeted since Musk, Tesla's chief executive and the world's richest person, allied himself with Donald Trump and helped propel the president to election victory last year.
While liberals reported mostly positive intentions around buying an electric car in August 2023, their overall support for EVs eroded in the wake of a collapse in their opinion of Teslas, according to the new study, which polled Americans on an array of environmental actions.
By the latest poll, taken in March as Musk was gutting the federal workforce in his role as Trump's top adviser after delivering what appeared to be a Nazi salute, the intention to buy any EV among liberals slipped into negative territory.
'The suspicion is that Elon Musk became so synonymous with EVs in the US that perceptions of him affected the entire class of vehicles,' said Alexandra Flores, a psychologist at Williams College and lead author of the study, published in Nature.
'This made them way less appealing to liberals – he really dragged down perceptions of EVs in general. It's definitely unusual to have a chief executive have an impact on a whole class of products like this.'
Opposition to Musk over his alliance with Trump, which has since ruptured in acrimony, caused many liberal Tesla owners in the US and Europe to express embarrassment with their vehicles. Some have even adorned their cars with anti-Musk stickers that feature slogans such as 'Anti Elon Tesla Club' or 'I Bought This Before Elon Went Crazy.'
However, the new study found that Musk's rightwing shift has not made conservative Americans more likely to buy a Tesla or any electric car, despite separate polling showing that Republican voters now have a more favorable view of the car company than they once did. Views on Musk are also sharply divided between conservatives and liberals.
Even as liberals dramatically changed their views of Tesla, and to a lesser extent EVs, most conservatives remain skeptical of both and have been consistently unwilling to consider buying an electric car in the past two years of polling.
While buying an electric vehicle was the most politically polarized environmental action when the researchers' polling began, more so than installing solar panels or even eating less red meat, Democrats and Republicans are now more in line than they were following Musk's political foray.
'We thought that liberals would be pretty stable because EVs are so historically associated with the green movement and that Musk's rightward turn would bring conservatives on board,' said Flores.
'But the opposite happened – over time conservatives remained relatively steady in their lack of interest in EVs and Tesla, while liberals' attitudes really dropped. They are now equally unlikely to buy an EV as they are a Tesla.'
Flores said that EVs' association with climate-friendly politics may be more influential for conservatives than liberals when it comes to purchasing decisions. 'The attitude among conservatives to Tesla may be slightly less negative than before but that didn't translate into the part of psychology of how they intended to behave,' she said. 'That strong link to liberalism is too much for them to be budged on. It's more foundational to them than if they like or don't like Elon Musk.'
Musk has recently admitted that Tesla faces a 'rough few quarters' ahead amid stuttering sales figures for the company in the US. Last week, Tesla announced sales for the second quarter of 2025 were 12% down on the same period last year, amid consumer concerns over tariffs, Tesla's lineup and the imminent removal of tax credits, as well as Musk's own image.
In California, Tesla's heartland, the situation is particularly stark, with the company posting a seventh consecutive quarter of declines in new vehicle registrations.
Overall EV sales in the US dipped in the three months to July, year-on-year, and the shift to electric models is likely to be slowed further by a Republican spending bill, signed by Trump, that axes a key incentive for buyers to opt for an EV. From September, a tax credit of up to $7,500 for an electric car purchase will be deleted, with dealers expecting a rush of people to take advantage of the subsidy before it expires.
'You can't deny there are people who say they won't buy a Tesla but the company's numbers aren't too surprising,' said Erin Keating, executive analyst at Cox Automotive. 'They have had two major products that are major sellers, they haven't changed them in years and there is now a big influx of new and more exciting electric products out there.
'I'm not sure you can attribute any falloff in EV sales to Elon, maybe him being on both sides of the coin will free EVs from being a political lightning rod,' Keating said, adding that total market share for EVs may not break 10% this year, as previously forecast.
'The removal of the tax credits may slow things down, it will hurt consumers' perception of whether they can afford an EV or not,' she said. 'But EVs aren't going away – adoption may stagnate but it won't go off a cliff. We've invested too much into it and there are too many good products on the market now.'
Transportation is the largest contributor to planet-heating pollution in the US and any slowdown in EV adoption would hinder attempts to address the climate crisis.
'One of the more troubling implications of our study is what this means for the climate,' said Flores. 'It is possible, though, that Musk's shadow over EVs starts to fade, even if opinions about Tesla don't recover. That pride in driving a climate-friendly vehicle may rebound among liberals.'