Trump is buying a Tesla. A look at the harsh things he’s had to say about EVs over the years
Mar 11, 2025, 10:42 AM
A Tesla driver in Lynnwood was harassed and cut off by another driver on her way to a doctor鈥檚 appointment Wednesday morning. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes, File)
Credit: ASSOCIATED PRESS
(AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes, File)
WASHINGTON (AP) 鈥� President Donald Trump, who’s buying a Tesla to show loyalty to company CEO Elon Musk, has had plenty to say about electric vehicles over the years. Most of it is not good.
Of course, Trump was once a sharp critic of Musk, too, which is especially notable given how tight the pair are now.
A look at some of Trump’s comments on EVs 鈥� and Musk:
Trump marked Christmas 2023 with a social media post lumping 鈥淎ll Electric Car Lunacy鈥� in with a number of political enemies that he said 鈥渁re looking to destroy our once great USA. MAY THEY ROT IN HELL.鈥�
A few weeks earlier, during a rally in Ankeny, Iowa, Trump said of EVs: 鈥淭hey don鈥檛 go far. They cost a fortune.鈥� He also suggested that the U.S. military was looking at making 鈥淎rmy tanks all electric鈥� and scoffing, 鈥測ou鈥檙e in the middle of the desert and you say, 鈥榊ou know what, we鈥檙e running low on electric. Do they have a charger around anywhere?鈥欌��
In November 2023, at a Claremont, New Hampshire, rally, Trump similarly picked up on distance being an electric vehicle issue: 鈥淵ou can鈥檛 get out of New Hampshire in an electric car.鈥�
鈥淲here are you going? 鈥業鈥檓 going to Massachusetts.鈥� Well, you better get yourself a gas turbine because this car is not going to get you there,” he said. 鈥淲ell, you could, if you stop about four times.鈥�
That followed his joke during an event in Clive, Iowa, the previous month: “Electric cars are good if you have a towing company.”
Electric vehicles were an especially attractive Trump target during the six-week United Auto Workers strike in September 2023. That’s when he told a rally in Clinton Township, Michigan, 鈥淵ou go all electric so you can drive for 15 minutes before you have to get a charge.鈥�
Trump, a Republican, also posted on his social media site that then-President Joe Biden, a Democrat, sold autoworkers “down the river with his ridiculous all Electric Car Hoax.” He suggested that promoting electric vehicles 鈥渨as the idea of the Radical Left Fascists, Marxists, & Communists” and that “Within 3 years, all of these cars will be made in China.鈥�
As on many top issues, Trump has been inconsistent on electric vehicles. During his first term, in September 2020, an all-electric Lordstown Motors Endurance truck at an event outside the White House, calling it an 鈥渋ncredible vehicle.鈥�
After Musk endorsed the former president’s bid to return to the White House, Trump began suggesting that electric vehicles could work for some buyers.
鈥淚鈥檓 for electric cars. I have to be because Elon endorsed me very strongly,” Trump said during an August rally in Atlanta.
In a subsequent conversation on X, the social media platform Musk also owns, Trump called Tesla a 鈥済reat product鈥� while noting, 鈥淭hat doesn鈥檛 mean everybody should have an electric car.鈥�
During his no Biden mandate to force the purchase of EVs, his policies were aimed at encouraging Americans to buy them and car companies to shift from gas-powered vehicles to electric cars.
Just like he had a change of heart about EVs, Trump has changed his tune about Musk, who’s now one of his advisers. When the pair got into an online feud in 2022, Trump ridiculed Musk for seeking support during his first term.
鈥淲hen Elon Musk came to the White House asking me for help on all of his many subsidized projects, whether it鈥檚 electric cars that don鈥檛 drive long enough, driverless cars that crash, or rocketships to nowhere, without which subsidies he鈥檇 be worthless, and telling me how he was a big Trump fan and Republican, I could have said, 鈥榙rop to your knees and beg,鈥� and he would have done it,鈥� Trump wrote then.
