It resembled a sales pitch for Musks company, the countrys biggest seller of EVs.
Tesla has lostmore than half of its valuesince December as sales haveplummeted worldwide.
Over the past week, protesters havevandalized Tesla dealerships,set Cybertrucks aflame, and boycotted the brand.
Donald Trump in a Tesla.© Andrew Harnik/Getty Images
Liberal Tesla drivers haveslapped stickers on their carsthat read I bought this before Elon went crazy.
The strong feelings surrounding Musk have already started to scramble the politics around EVs.
Compared to August,13 percent more Republicans are willingto consider purchasing a Tesla.
Yet there are reasons to suspect that EVs will continue to be a hard sell for Republicans.
So I dont think that youre going to see a spike in Tesla sales among conservatives.
If they came around to any electric vehicle, however, it might be a Tesla.
A Tesla EV became a symbol of Teslas CEO.
And the same thing is true with the vehicles we purchase.
We often want them to show who we are, what weve accomplished, what we stand for.
Of course, there are ways to depolarize electric vehicles that dont rely on cues from Trump or Musk.
Just two years ago, Trump complained that EVsneeded a charge every 15 minutesand wouldkill American jobs.
I have to be, you know, Trump said, because Elon endorsed me very strongly.
Thats beautiful, he said, admiring the dashboard.
This is a different panel than Ive had.
This article originally appeared inGristathttps://grist.org/politics/elon-musk-tesla-trump-republicans-electric-vehicles/.
Grist is a nonprofit, independent media organization dedicated to telling stories of climate solutions and a just future.
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