Tesla’s Stock Crashes; Trump Stages a Bizarre PR Stunt

Summary

Bulwark Takes: Tesla’s Stock Crashes; Trump Stages a Bizarre PR Stunt
Release Date: March 11, 2025

Introduction

In this episode of Bulwark Takes, Sam Stein and Lauren Egan delve into the turbulent recent developments surrounding Tesla, Elon Musk, and former President Donald Trump. The discussion centers on Tesla's declining stock performance, Musk's mounting challenges, and Trump's unconventional move to support Tesla amidst political and market pressures.

Tesla’s Stock Performance Decline

The episode opens with Sam Stein highlighting the recent downturn in Tesla's stock. Tesla experienced a significant drop, closing last Friday at $262 despite a minor uptick earlier in the week by approximately 3.8%. However, by mid-week, the stock had plummeted to $480—a stark decline that has raised concerns among investors and stakeholders.

Trump’s PR Stunt at the White House

Lauren Egan provides context to Trump's latest maneuver: a surprise event at the White House where Trump showcased five Tesla vehicles, including a Cybertruck adorned with red, white, and blue colors. This move comes at a time when Tesla is under intense scrutiny from Democrats and facing declining stock values. Lauren notes, “[Trump] is going to buy a Tesla at the White House. He's going to look at some Teslas” (00:59).

Elon Musk’s Involvement and Interaction with Trump

Elon Musk was present at the event, engaging in conversations and demonstrating the vehicles alongside Trump. Sam Stein humorously points out the irony of Musk, one of Trump's significant donors, supporting the former president: “He affirms he's both the CEO of Tesla still and Trump's top advisor. Not that there's any conflict of interest at all here” (01:54).

During the event, Trump expressed admiration for Tesla’s technological advancements. At 05:17, Trump remarks, “Wow, that's beautiful. This is a different panel than I passed. Everything's computer. That's beautiful,” showcasing his amazement at the vehicle's features. Elon Musk responded by simplifying the car’s operation for Trump: “It’s like driving a go cart, basically” (05:48).

Tesla Protests and the 'Take That' Movement

The conversation shifts to the growing protests against Tesla, which have occasionally escalated into vandalism and arson. Lauren explains that while the organizers of these protests advocate for nonviolent demonstrations to pressure Musk and the Republican Party, the recent event at the White House suggests that the movement is gaining traction: “[They are] using protests to highlight that Elon Musk is not an elected official and to put pressure on Musk and the Republican Party” (08:04).

Political Implications and the Musk-Trump Relationship

Sam Stein theorizes that Musk's increasing unpopularity is inadvertently strengthening his alliance with Trump. As Elon grapples with negative public sentiment, Trump’s endorsement of Tesla serves as a strategic maneuver to align with Musk’s base. Lauren adds that grassroots activists on the left are targeting Musk as a vulnerable link to the MAGA movement, rather than focusing on Trump himself (11:30).

The episode also touches on Musk’s online presence and its impact on Tesla’s stock. Sam mentions, “He’s chronically online in a way that’s making even a little concerning, considering he has so many jobs” (09:06), highlighting how Musk’s active engagement on platforms like Twitter can influence investor perceptions and market performance.

Conclusion

As the episode wraps up, Sam Stein and Lauren Egan reflect on the intertwined relationship between Elon Musk and Donald Trump. Stein posits that the challenges Musk faces may inadvertently bind him closer to Trump, complicating the political landscape. Lauren concurs, noting the potential pressures Republican lawmakers might face as the situation evolves (11:24).

The discussion underscores the complex interplay between business leadership, political alliances, and public perception, illustrating how Tesla’s struggles are not just financial but deeply embedded in the broader cultural and political fabric.

Notable Quotes

• Sam Stein (00:00): “Tesla's stock is down. It's up today about 3.8% or so, but it closed that Friday at 262. It's now 2:30. Today at Tesla was 480, so it's been down badly.”

• Lauren Egan (00:59): “Trump is going to buy a Tesla at the White House. He's going to look at some Teslas.”

• Donald Trump (05:17): “Wow, that's beautiful. This is a different panel than I passed. Everything's computer. That's beautiful.”

• Elon Musk (05:38): “Yeah, it’s just a brake and an accelerator. I don't want to give Secret Service matter.”

• Donald Trump (10:37): “He's an incredible patriot, and I don't even know if he's a Republican. I really don't.”

Stay Informed

For more in-depth analysis and updates on the Tesla situation and its broader implications, subscribe to Bulwark Takes and stay informed with the latest from the Bulwark team.

Transcript

[Sam Stein]

Hey, guys, it's me, Sam Stein, managing editor, Bulwark. I'm here with Lauren Egan and we're going to be talking Tesla and really we're going to be talking about Trump trying to showcase Tesla out in front of the White House because Tesla's not doing too well because Elon's kind of screwing things up and people are mad at him. Also, the markets are really shitty. Before we do that, let's subscribe. Let's get you to subscribe to the feed. We are doing well. Our numbers are going up. I don't like Teslas. All right, so Lauren, backstory here is it's been, what, a pretty bad couple weeks for Tesla. Their. Their stock is down. It's up today about 3.8% or so, but it closed that Friday at 262. It's now 2:30. Today at ties were 480, so it's been down badly. And Elon's been targeted aggressively by Democrats and Tesla specifically. And so Trump does what? He's like, I'm going to sell some cars. I'm going to buy a car. Like, what happened here?

[Lauren Egan]

So this afternoon his press secretary gets up there on the podium and it's like, hey, guys. So we didn't have this event on the schedule, but later this afternoon, Trump is going to buy a Tesla at the White House. He's going to look at some Teslas. We knew he was going to buy one.

[Sam Stein]

We didn't know.

[Lauren Egan]

We didn't know that there was going to be like a whole event with five different Teslas.

[Sam Stein]

Was there five?

[Lauren Egan]

Apparently there was five.

[Sam Stein]

Oh, my God. Okay. Wow.

[Lauren Egan]

Including a cybertruck, they got red, white and blue thing going on there. So, you know. Yeah. So he comes out this afternoon and does this like, you know, super long kind of Q and A with reporters as he's walking around and checking out these Tesla's.

[Sam Stein]

And Elon's there too, obviously.

[Lauren Egan]

And Elon's there chatting it up the whole time.

[Sam Stein]

He affirms he's both the CEO of Tesla still and Trump's top advisor. Not that there's any conflict of interest at all here.

[Lauren Egan]

No, none. Yeah, I mean, it's like kind of hilarious because Trump obviously campaigned against EVs. Like every rally was him like, shitting on EVs, and now there's this massive.

[Sam Stein]

What would he say? Be like, you never know when you're going to lose a charge. What if it's not, you know, if there's no wind, you might be in the middle of the country and there's no charging station. Yes.

[Lauren Egan]

Yeah. So.

[Sam Stein]

Lucky bees.

[Lauren Egan]

Yeah. So it's just, like, funny that he's having this big EV event now at the White House because, you know, Musk, one of his biggest donors, is suffering a bit with some of these protests. And obviously the stock market just kind.

[Sam Stein]

Of, you know, it's so hard to comprehend an analogy, like, of what a Democratic presidency would be like in the situation. It's just. It would be like if Jeff Zients. If. If Biden took Jeff Zients out into the back and was like, everyone needs to go and buy call your mother bagels.

[Lauren Egan]

Like, but, like, not even because he did.

[Sam Stein]

Like, he sold whatever, but Jeff Zines would. Had to still own it.

[Lauren Egan]

People that don't know call your mother is a D.C. bagel store pretty good that Biden's former chief of staff.

[Sam Stein]

What?

[Lauren Egan]

Sam?

[Sam Stein]

Well, I'm. I'm a bit of a snob on this stuff.

[Lauren Egan]

Okay.

[Sam Stein]

But let's say. Let's say Biden went out into the back of the White House, had a table of all of call your mother's best spreads, and was sampling them and talking about how great the bagels were and how everyone needed to go and buy bagels and that, you know, it was totally unfair that call your mother was being targeted by Republicans and all that stuff. People would be like, this is crazy behavior.

[Lauren Egan]

But also, it's a bagel.

[Sam Stein]

Also it's bagels. They would have had. Like, who cares? Yeah.

[Lauren Egan]

There just isn't. There is no equivalent comparison. And also, there's not the equivalent of someone who's a given amount, the same amount of money as Musk has. You know, like, Z didn't like that. That isn't there.

[Sam Stein]

Zein didn't put $290 million.

[Lauren Egan]

So it's. It's different.

[Sam Stein]

It's totally different. And, you know, Trump does this stuff because everything's a culture war, right? It's like, if you're. If they're against the Teslas, he's got to be for the Teslas, even though he was also against electric vehicles. And it's just like, everything's divided on cultural lines these days. Let's. Let's watch. I did have some fun watching Trump kind of explore the Tesla. It appears he's never stepped foot in one before, which makes sense. Like, he's not driving. Okay.

[Lauren Egan]

There's no way he's driven himself. And.

[Sam Stein]

Well, we saw some. There's no, no, there was a video of him in Melania in a car that sor. Surface to Wago. But I think more or less it's fair to assume he's not driving a lot and he's certainly like getting in a Tesla and he shouldn't be. Yeah, no, I mean, I think he was. No, he was in a cybertruck. I should take it back. During the campaign, he went inside a cybertruck because one of the podcast personalities or, or used or streamers had him on for an hour long show. And one of the things that was gifted to Trump at the end of the show was a cybertruck that was outfitted for Trump. So he's been inside a cybertruck. I know that, but I don't think he's been inside one of these like Model X's or anything like that. So let's watch. In his wonderment, his, his, his amusement at seeing what a Tesla is like.

[Donald Trump]

Wow, that's beautiful. This is a different panel than I passed. Everything's computer. That's beautiful.

[Sam Stein]

Wow.

[Elon Musk]

Yeah, it's just a brake and an accelerator. I don't want give Secret Service matter.

[Donald Trump]

That's beautiful.

[Elon Musk]

Can you start it?

[Donald Trump]

Should I.

[Elon Musk]

Can I get around? So do you want to actually drive it?

[Donald Trump]

You don't. You don't want me to drive it to you? I saw Biden do a. I'll tell you, it could be very easy to drive. That's, that's. You're the only one that saw it.

[Elon Musk]

So it's, it's like, it's like driving a go cart, basically.

[Donald Trump]

Very simple.

[Elon Musk]

It's very simple. So it's literally like the bulk part that goes with the.

[Sam Stein]

All right, so there. Trump's just sort of amazed at the computers. A lot of computers. Elon, helpfully, I will say this is very clever of Elon tells him it's a golf cart that goes really fast. I think that's very relatable for Trump.

[Lauren Egan]

Very appealing.

[Sam Stein]

Well, appealing. And also that one, you can say, oh, yeah. You push a button and you go, I get it. I understand what Elon's getting.

[Lauren Egan]

Yeah. But you know, it's just like this giant infomercial.

[Sam Stein]

Oh, yeah.

[Lauren Egan]

It's a giant White house South Lawn.

[Sam Stein]

I know, it's crazy. It's unbelievable. They're doing that. And then Trump says other stuff. He's like, we're gonna buy. You know, Elon's gonna ramp up operations. There's one piece that came out.

[Lauren Egan]

Yeah.

[Sam Stein]

He. What did it say?

[Lauren Egan]

That he.

[Sam Stein]

Go ahead.

[Lauren Egan]

Elon said before Trump got in the car, Elon said that he was going to double vehicle output. In the US in the next two years and kind of like spiel about how it was a demonstration of his. I think he said, act of faith in America. So I guess he is feeling like perhaps his stock might recover or maybe.

[Sam Stein]

It'S just a bluff. Yeah, I mean, project for sure. You know, confidence. Right. But the other thing that Trump said is he will label violence against Tesla dealers as domestic terrorism. So that gets us to the reporting you've been doing, which is on Tesla. Take that movement. You know, obviously it's, it's, it's spreading. We've seen a number of different articles about it and gaining momentum, but it has occasionally turned into arson and vandalism. So can you talk about just sort of the fine line here? I know Rokhana was up on Twitter saying or denouncing that aspect of it.

[Lauren Egan]

I think this happens a lot of times, like, with some of these movements. You get, you know, a few bad actors in the mix, and there have been, you know, some kind of harrowing and scary stories to come out of some of these. These protests. But the groups that are organizing behind it have been really sort of consistent in saying we only think nonviolent protests work. We are only trying to, you know, really, like, highlight that Elon Musk is not an elected official and absent, you know, a sort of like, congressional type office that elected officials would have, these are kind of our next best bet to kind of get. Get his attention. Right. And to, you know, put some pressure on Musk and the Republican Party. Well, I would say based off of the event that just happened at the.

[Sam Stein]

White House, I guess it is working. This is the surest evidence. And I don't know. I've been monitoring Elon online. He's clearly like, you know, first of all, he's. He's chronically online in a way that's.

[Lauren Egan]

Making even a little concerning, considering he has so many jobs.

[Sam Stein]

Well, I was talking about with Tim is like, he's online and, like, his spaceships are blowing up his Tesla stock.

[Lauren Egan]

It was like that Dave Portnoy tweet from last week where he was like, how. How far does the Tesla stock have to drop before Elon goes back to work?

[Sam Stein]

I know, Which I think is a fair question. It's totally a fair question. But so to your point, though, it. It's bothering Elon, I think. I mean, I'm not trying to be like, arm psychologist here, but it clearly is bothering him because, yeah, I mean.

[Lauren Egan]

I think that's what that whole, like, active faith in America comment was like. Exemplary of two. Clearly he's trying to play it cool, but he's responding to all this stuff on Twitter. Right. You know, Trump's out there doing truth social posts about this at night.

[Sam Stein]

Well, Hannity bought a car or something like that.

[Lauren Egan]

Right. Hannity said last night on his show that he was also going to go out there.

[Sam Stein]

I think Alex Jones is buying a car.

[Lauren Egan]

It's just like, yeah, you guys should just go to his Twitter account and see the monstrosity of that. Custom made.

[Sam Stein]

Custom made. Cyber.

[Lauren Egan]

Yeah.

[Sam Stein]

You don't have one?

[Lauren Egan]

No. Although I do have a hybrid car. So, you know.

[Sam Stein]

But not a Tesla.

[Lauren Egan]

Not a Tesla.

[Sam Stein]

Okay, so where does this leave us? Elon's in a little bit of buying. Trump's coming to his back. And then we had this kind of funny moment where Trump is trying to explain if he thinks Elon is doing a good job and if he's even a Republican. He says this.

[Donald Trump]

He's an incredible patriot, and I don't even know if he's a Republican. I really don't.

[Sam Stein]

All right, so there you have it. Trump doesn't know if Elon's a Republican. I don't know. I think they're gonna end up. This is the thing, though, here's my theory, is that the more Elon gets attacked personally, I think the more Trump rallies to his side and the more they're kind of bound together. And that's kind of the. The irony of this is that one of the things that Trump opponents were trying to do early on was to create a fissure between the two of them. And I think, you know, this will probably bind them together. It doesn't mean it's good politically or bad political, but just that's just the outcome of this, because Trump.

[Lauren Egan]

Yeah, I think that's probably right. I think we'll have to see what sort of pressure, you know, when Republican lawmakers go home for recess and everything, like, what kind of pressure they face about it.

[Sam Stein]

Elon's definitely more unpopular right now than Trump. Like, there's empirical polling data on that.

[Lauren Egan]

Which is why you see, you know, grassroots activists on the left obviously choosing to target him and go after him as opposed to making this all about Trump or something. They see him as this, like, weak link and, you know, the MAGA chain or whatever.

[Sam Stein]

And he's kind of messing things up a little bit for Trump, too. Like, he did the interview yesterday on Fox, and I, I mean, I saw the context of it. He was clearly talking about waste and fraud in Social Security. But then he went. He said, we're going to cut 500 to 700 trillion a billion dollars in there. And that's just, you know, a huge amount of money that has no correlation to what is why they perceive to be the amount of waste and fraud in the program. And it leads questions like what you saw today, debriefing about whether Trump is eyeing Social Security. That's not good for Trump.

[Lauren Egan]

Yeah. It's like every single time that Elon Musk is in front of a camera, there's basically just, like, gold he's handing over to Democratic ad makers. Like, we just know all this stuff is going to appear. Yeah. You know, in midterms or even before then you call it a Ponzi scheme.

[Sam Stein]

Yeah. The easiest thing to do.

[Lauren Egan]

Right. You just see that, like, running over and over and over again, and it's a huge political liability, which, you know, they have to recognize.

[Sam Stein]

Yeah. Well, they're just getting into Teslas instead. All right, Lauren Egan. I'll give everyone who watches a little bit of a heads up. She's writing about the Tesla movement, the abandoned Tesla movement. Tesla. Take that movement. For Wednesday's newsletter, which you should all be subscribing to. It's great. Only. Oh, you've only done one. But I already know it's great. Thank you for joining us. Appreciate it. Thank you guys for subscribing to the feed. We appreciate that, too. Stay in touch. Keep watching.

[Lauren Egan]

Thanks, Sam.

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