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President Trump has been shopping for a Tesla this week, including sitting in a red Model S at the White House. He says he's buying a vehicle as a show of support for his adviser, Elon Musk. Tesla's sales have been dropping, and its stock price fell dramatically since the inauguration. Democrats are turning away from the brand. Could growing popularity among Republicans make up for it? NPR's Camila Domonoske reports.
CAMILA DOMONOSKE, BYLINE: You have probably heard about the protests at Tesla dealerships, the owners with buyer's remorse and apologetic bumper stickers, people calling Teslas swastikars. Suffice it to say Musk's rightward turn has turned off a lot of would-be Tesla buyers. But of course, there are also a lot of people in this country who like what Elon Musk is doing. People like Kamali Wright. He works in marketing in Florida and spoke to me from inside his Model 3, which he's owned for several years.
KAMALI WRIGHT: Man, I've been a fan of Elon forever. After seeing him team up with Trump, to me, I was like, oh, man, you know, this is, like, my two favorite people now.
DOMONOSKE: Wright says the massive backlash against Musk makes him more inclined to buy a Tesla. He wants a Cybertruck next.
WRIGHT: You know, if everybody's going to hate on this guy, that's going to make me buy even more (laughter), I guess.
DOMONOSKE: There's also Norman Pieniaczek (ph). In the '80s, he was an underground publisher fighting censorship in Poland after the government imposed martial law. He moved to the U.S., and a few years ago, when his posts challenging the science about COVID were taken down on Facebook and Twitter, it felt like censorship all over again. Then Musk announced he wanted to buy Twitter and restore free speech.
NORMAN PIENIACZEK: So I said, OK, that's my guy.
DOMONOSKE: Pieniaczek needed a new car anyway. He was planning to get a gas-powered car, but...
PIENIACZEK: If it's my guy, my heart is with him. I have to put my money where my heart is.
DOMONOSKE: He bought a Model X in 2022. Now, look, it's very unusual to buy a car to support a CEO, but it's very normal for car buyers to use their purchase to signal things about themselves. Once upon a time, driving a Tesla signaled you were tech savvy, eco-conscious, just plain rich. Now for many people, it shows support for Musk and Trump. And here's the problem for Tesla. Right now, there are simply not enough Wrights and Pieniaczeks to make up for all the people who are not buying Teslas because of Musk.
ALEXANDER EDWARDS: There are going to be no explosion of sales that recover the losses that Tesla has been enduring because of this political shift.
DOMONOSKE: Alexander Edwards runs Strategic Insights (ph), a company that surveys new car buyers. His data last year showed that for the first time, a new Tesla buyer was more likely to be a Republican than a Democrat. But that's not because Republican sales surged. It's because many Democrats were fleeing.
EDWARDS: All they've done is alienate their primary consumer, and those that would love to buy them are not in a position to buy them.
DOMONOSKE: That's not just ideological opposition to EVs. Republicans are more likely to live in areas with less charging infrastructure. Cities and areas with more progressive governments typically have more plugs available. Tesla and Musk did not respond to requests for comment, but Musk has previously said it's the quality of the product that matters, not a CEO's views.
Jessica Caldwell is an analyst with Edmunds, the car data giant. She says Tesla is different than other car companies. Everyone has an opinion about the CEO, and that's a problem.
JESSICA CALDWELL: Why would you ever want to alienate potential buyers in general?
DOMONOSKE: That said, Caldwell notes multiple reasons why Tesla sales are struggling right now. There's more competition. There's an updated Model Y coming, giving shoppers a reason to wait a few months, so you would expect that to pull down sales. There's also plenty of drivers who say their feelings about Musk have nothing to do with what's in their driveway. Like Nancy Baroody, a conservative Tesla driver.
NANCY BAROODY: I really don't let politics influence, you know, what kind of a product I like or the car that I buy.
DOMONOSKE: But in general, politics can influence car sales, and that's especially true for EVs. Mike Murphy is a Republican strategist and EV enthusiast who has spent years pondering why more Republicans won't buy EVs. He argues that long before Musk's political turn, EVs were already politicized as symbols of green liberal values.
MIKE MURPHY: They're seen as political statements, not as cars, and that's not good for selling more electric vehicles.
DOMONOSKE: He'd like to see EVs sold on their merits - the gas savings, the quick acceleration, the smooth and quiet ride, never changing oil again.
MURPHY: Take the politics out of it and let people with clear eyes pick the car that's best for them and choose the powertrain they like.
DOMONOSKE: Right now, taking politics out of EVs isn't exactly happening. Murphy says what Musk is doing is a little bit like pouring gasoline on a battery fire. Camila Domonoske, NPR News. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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