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Economists from the National Bureau of Economic Research by Yale have done the hard work of trying to quantify the Tesla sales hit that has come from Elon Musk’s sharp, deep, radical turn to the right. It’s a daunting task. Without a doubt, it can’t be perfectly quantified. But kudos to them for trying.
Before getting to the results, I think it’s important to dispel some common talking points. It is not simply that Elon Musk supported or funded a Republican politician. Musk was extremely vocal and radical, often the center of attention himself (remember when he was holding a press conference in the Oval Office while his son wiped boogers on Trump’s desk and Trump turned his face away in disgust), and was directly involved in drastic actions that shocked or horrified many people, like killing USAID (and numerous lives as a result), decapitating the federal government and independent investigators (many of whom were investigating his companies, serendipitously), and giving young, racist, unqualified boys access to extremely sensitive US taxpayer data. And there were numerous extreme tweets even before the 2024 election.
Elon Musk’s wild, nonsenical COVID-19 projection on March 19, 2020.
On to the study. The good news is that one other result of Elon Musk’s political activities is they advanced Tesla’s original mission — pushing legacy automakers to sell EVs. The study found that his antics boosted competing automakers’ electric and hybrid sales by 17% to 22%.
“Without the Musk partisan effect, Tesla sales between October 2022 and April 2025 would have been 67–83% higher, equivalent to 1–1.26 million more vehicles,” the study authors write.
For sure, it is interesting to try to determine how many buyers turned away from Tesla because of Elon Musk’s extremist behavior. However, the study is not complete. It does not evaluate how many fewer sales Tesla will gain due to Republicans, including Donald Trump, killing the US EV tax credit. That’s another big chunk of sales, and we haven’t even seen the ramifications of that yet since the tax credit ended less than a month ago.
Beyond vehicle sales, there’s the matter of the Trump administration completely ignoring fuel efficiency requirements and taking away the opportunity for Tesla to sell regulatory credits to lagging automakers in the US. That may not limit Tesla’s sales, but it does hurt its finances!
We actually have no idea how many sales Tesla has lost due to Elon Musk’s far-right-wing activities and statements, because there are other factors at play as well — a somewhat stale product lineup, growing competition, brand saturation (too many people who would buy a Tesla already having bought a Tesla), bad press for other reasons, etc. That said, the 1 million to 1.26 million vehicle estimate does sound about right on the surface. But that’s before the coming sales hit from losing the US EV tax credit.
What do you think? Is anything being missed? Is the sales hit that big? Bigger? It’s actually anyone’s guess. But we aren’t all Yale economists.
Elon Musk and Tesla Cybertruck at unveiling. Photo by Kyle Field.
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