Biden does not even pronounce the word “Tesla”, irritating Musk

President Joe Biden is in favor of electric vehicles saying they are vital to his economic and climate ambitions.

But there’s one American car company he’s not talking about: Tesla Inc., the world’s most valuable automaker and the global brand most clearly associated with electric vehicles.

“I was serious when I said that the future would be made right here in the United States”, Biden commented in a video on Twitter with the president and CEO of General Motors Co., Mary Barra, Thursday. “Companies like GM and Ford are making more electric vehicles in America than ever before.”

The tweet did not go unnoticed by the avid web user and CEO of Tesla, Elon Musk. “It starts with a T. It ends with an A. And it has the letters ESL in the middle“, answered.

At every opportunity Biden praise the progress Ford Y GM have achieved in the deployment of an electric fleet. But his continued and obvious snubs to Tesla, a source of mild intrigue within the administration, have provoked increasingly exasperated public reactions from Musk, the world’s richest person and the CEO of both Tesla and Apple. SpaceXwhich has government contracts with NASA and the United States Army.

Musk tweeted after Thursday’s White House event with Barra and the CEO of Ford, Jim Farleythat “Biden is treating the American public like fools”. He added that the president is “a human-shaped sock puppet”. Over the weekend, he goaded fans into starting an online petition asking the president to “Recognize Tesla’s leadership in electric vehicles”.

In 2021, Tesla delivered more than 936,000 cars worldwide. GM it sold nearly 480,000 electric vehicles last year, mostly in China. In the United States, the company had to recall its electric Chevrolet Bolt because of the risk of battery fires, and it sold just 26 electric cars in the fourth quarter — 25 Bolts and one GMC Hummer electric pickup.

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There is no real mystery behind Biden’s antipathy towards Tesla, according to a person familiar with the president’s thinking. Biden has long enjoyed the support of unions in his political campaigns, including the United Auto Workers (UAW), and while Tesla employees have generous wages and benefits, including automaker stock, Musk opposes unions and workers. of the company are not organized into one.

Within TeslaSome executives get the sense that this is all just politics: Biden will never win Texas, where Musk now lives, while Michigan — home to Ford and GM — and UAW support are key to Democratic victories in both the midterm elections as in 2024.

Even some Biden advisers say they wish the president would warm up to Musk’s company.

Last year, after a White House event promoting electric vehicles, and excluding Tesla, Musk said that Biden was “slanted” against the company and that its Administration “appears to be controlled by the unions”.

Musk also disparaged a key Biden policy: the proposal to reinstate a $7,500 per car tax credit for electric vehicles and remove a cap on the number of vehicles from any one manufacturer that are eligible for the credit. Tesla reached the limit of the original tax credit for electric vehicles in 2018.

However, Biden’s proposal has an anti-Tesla twist: Consumers would be eligible for an extra $4,500 if they buy an electric car assembled by union workers.

Musk did not respond to an email requesting comment for this story.

Tesla, which was founded in 2003, makes fully electric cars at its factories in California and Shanghai. The company moved its corporate headquarters last year from Palo Alto, California, to Austin, Texas, where it completed a new factory that is larger than the Pentagon.

Tesla has about 10,000 workers at its factory in Fremont, California. The Detroit-based UAW has made several attempts to unionize workers there with little success.