As someone who covered and vividly remembers the Vietnam War protests that consumed this country in the 1960s and ’70s, I can safely say that the anti-Musk and Trump demonstrations popping up around the country are small by comparison. But they’re growing … and quickly. For how long and to what end it’s too soon to know. But they are worth noting.
Whoever thought Tesla dealerships and charging stations would be the epicenter of unrest? They are, by the hundreds. The actions of Trump and his unelected sidekick have gotten many Americans off their collective couches, which is saying a lot.
The Republican Party has long claimed to be the party of free speech. If that claim was specious before, it is outright ridiculous now. Trump has suggested opposing him could land you in jail. He has threatened to pull funding from colleges and universities that allow illegal — his word — protests on campuses. He has promised to arrest, expel, and/or deport students and faculty who participate, citing supposed national security concerns.
It has already happened. Some university students, in the country legally, have been yanked out of their homes or grabbed off the street because of possible objections to the war in Gaza. One does not have to approve of what they have done to say that, at the very least, they are entitled to legal due process.
Trump’s inclination toward curtailing freedom of speech extends to everyday Americans. The head of the National Republican Congressional Committee told his caucus to cancel in-person town hall meetings. As videos posted on social media have shown, growing numbers of people are angry, and they want answers from their elected representatives. Rather than face the proverbial music, Republican members are running scared. Representative Bill Huizenga of Michigan even told his constituents to stop calling his office. One hopes they are ignoring that request.
Our nation was founded on the principles of dissent and criticism. In the early 1760s, Britain imposed several direct and indirect taxes on the American colonies. The colonists, who were not represented in the British Parliament, believed Britain was taxing them unfairly to pay its war bills. The Boston Tea Party, an act of noncooperation in which colonists dumped British tea into Boston Harbor in protest, led to the start of the Revolutionary War.
Founding father John Adams hoped historians would view the many acts of noncooperation by colonists as the real “revolution,” not the War of Independence that followed them. “The Revolution was in the Minds of the People, and this was effected, from 1760 to 1775, in the course of fifteen Years before a drop of blood was drawn at Lexington,” Adams famously wrote to Thomas Jefferson.
According to the Crowd Counting Consortium, a Harvard-UCONN research project, resistance is alive and growing in the United States. In February, the effort counted 2,085 protests, versus 937 in February 2017, just after Trump was inaugurated the first time. And March is on course to have more than 3,000 protests.
Diversification of resistance methods is a hallmark of 2025. We have seen traditional protests but also more economic noncooperation, such as boycotts, strikes, and withholding of labor and purchasing power.
Consumer activists have launched boycotts of stores such as Target and Amazon to protest rollbacks of their DEI programs. During the February 28 Economic Blackout, a nationwide boycott, Target experienced a 9% drop in in-store traffic and a 14% drop on its website, according to Similarweb.
No retailer has been harder hit than Tesla. Its CEO, Elon Musk, is Enemy No. 1 for the many who view him as doing Trump’s dirty work, indiscriminately purging the U.S. civil service and upending the lives of thousands of Americans.
Once a symbol of liberal virtue, Tesla has become an albatross for many climate-conscious drivers. The car maker was the target of its very own protest day last weekend at hundreds of dealerships and charging stations all over the country and in Europe.
Some destruction has been directed at Tesla cars, showrooms, and charging stations. This is unfortunate and undermines public support for nonviolent protests.
Billionaires likely don’t care much about protests of any kind, but they do care about making money. The fact that Musk’s misdeeds are affecting Tesla’s bottom line has got to irk him, especially since a majority of his billions is tied up in the electric vehicle company’s stock price.
For the first time ever, Tesla saw a drop in car sales in 2024. This year is looking worse. And Tesla’s stock price has plummeted. As of this writing, Tesla has lost almost half of its value since its December high.
According to the car sales information company Edmunds, the number of Tesla trade-ins is at an all-time high, and online interest in buying a Tesla is at its lowest point in three years.
Lawmakers in New York state have called for the state pension fund to sell its 3.5 million shares of Tesla stock.
But this is as much about Trump as it is Tesla. His flood-the-zone strategy for turning America upside down has brought about an unintended consequence. He makes a lot of different people angry, because no one is exempt from these questionable and far-reaching policies. Trump has created coalitions where none existed before, perhaps to his detriment.
Groups that have historically supported Trump are now rethinking their allegiance: farmers and automakers hit hard by cuts in federal spending and tariffs; federal workers, many of whom have lost their jobs; Social Security recipients; Wall Street investors.
Many members of this new coalition are organizing. A nationwide mass mobilization, dubbed ‘Hands Off,’ will take place on Saturday, April 5, to protest Trump, Musk, and their policies.
According to HandsOff2025.com, “Donald Trump and Elon Musk think this country belongs to them. They’re taking everything they can get their hands on, and daring the world to stop them. On Saturday, April 5th, we’re taking to the streets nationwide to fight back with a clear message: Hands off!”
Labor unions, student organizations, and public interest groups are helping to organize more than 600 planned actions, including rallies, marches, and protests, across all 50 states.
When an authoritarian doesn’t like or is afraid of the narrative, he tries to change it. When that doesn’t work, he silences it. Trump is attempting to silence dissent. Will Americans allow it? Or will they rise up as they did in the Vietnam era? And if they do, will it make a decisive difference?
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Dan
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