Politics

Last weekend, a swarm of pickets converged on Tesla showrooms in dozens of cities across the U.S. I joined one on Saturday in San Francisco, and then a larger one on Monday. Since then, many more pickets have sprung up, with more being planned. It’s all under the loosely organized banner of “#TeslaTakedown.” And since there are no leaders or spokespeople, I can only say what drew me to join: the desire to declare, as my protest sign read, that “Musk is a Nazi.”

To start with, we need to name our enemy, without pulling punches: We are struggling against a fascist coup mounted by the Trump-Musk-Vance regime. We are not alone in this global struggle against fascism, or in facing the two existential threats it poses of nuclear omnicide and climate change.

An essential element of nonviolent resistance — particularly in cases of coups and authoritarian power grabs — is the withdrawal of cooperation. Coup-plotters, coup-makers and coup-profiteers are vulnerable to people power, and right now the unelected Musk is the most vulnerable.


Trump and Musk may deny it, but their actions and values are fascist. Trump delegated power to Musk to carry out the ongoing coup, and relied on Project 2025 to script it and put the orders in front of him to sign. But it’s Musk and his minions who have done most of the dirty work, and Musk who owns this coup in all its increasingly gory details. Musk needs to be held accountable — but first, he needs to be stopped.