Demonstrators denounce Musk, Trump at Long Beach Tesla dealership
About 50 people waved signs Saturday opposing the Trump administration’s immigration policy and gutting of federal agencies.
Long Beach residents outraged at the Trump administration’s recent firings of thousands of federal workers waved signs Saturday supporting democracy and attacking tyranny outside the Tesla dealership on Spring Street.
The protest was inspired by #TeslaTakedown, a growing movement that has seen protests against the Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk, who has been instrumental in dismantling key federal agencies and programs since Donald Trump returned to office.
“I have to do something,” Roberta Boyd, a retired teacher in Long Beach who still substitutes occasionally, said at the rally. “This is ridiculous. I just had to teach about the three branches of government, and I almost cried. It’s not easy teaching U.S. history right now.”
Many of the signs at the rally attacked Musk by name. “This Musk Stop,” “No Nerd Reich” and "Musk is not my president,” were just a few of the signs carried by demonstrators.
One man carried a sign saying “Elon took too much KKKetamine,” referring to both Musk’s right-wing extremism and his self-professed use of the drug. Other signs made fun of Trump by showing him wearing a crown, referring to his recent insistence on social media that he is, in fact, a king.
“I’m scared that our democracy is going to disappear,” said demonstrator Tracy Farr, an organizer with Indivisible, an activist movement opposed to the efforts of Musk and Trump. “I’m appalled at all the federal workers getting cut. The CDC especially, but also the attacks on science, cancer research and national parks.”
Ellen Gorbunoff, who is part of Indivisible’s South Bay chapter, said she started protesting Trump back in 2017, when he first became president. She cited his attempts to get rid of the Affordable Care Act and attacks on immigrants as key issues. “And he lies,” she added.
Ashley Craig said she has been an activist since she started protesting apartheid South Africa while in college. She said the Trump administration’s cutting of various agencies and programs “isn’t about saving money, it’s about getting rid of checks and balances, getting rid of resistance.”
Protests against Tesla dealerships have been growing in strength during the past weeks. Hundreds of people with signs saying “Musk Must Go” and “Resist Fascism” gathered at the Tesla showroom in downtown San Francisco Wednesday night, following similar demonstrations in cities like Santa Barbara and Palo Alto, according to SF Gate.
Musk, who was raised in apartheid South Africa, has a net worth of about $400 billion, making him the world’s richest man. He has publicly supported the far-right extremist party AfD in Germany and made an explicit Nazi salute at a Trump rally in January, donated $288 million to Trump’s campaign, according to the Washington Post.
Musk also turned X (formerly Twitter) into what NBC News called a “pro-Trump echo chamber” that promotes far-right extremists and propaganda.
In the early days of his second term of office, President Trump appointed Musk to run an outfit called DOGE (the "Department of Government Efficiency”), which is actually just a small team of wealthy executives, engineers and far-right ideologues who initially seized control of highly sensitive computer and payment systems in the U.S. Treasury Department and USAID (which dispenses foreign aid), the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Department of Education and the National Institutes of Health, according to The Guardian.
This access gives Musk, who remains a private citizen, access to the personal information of millions of Americans, according to Politico.
While a judge blocked DOGE and other Trump officials from accessing Treasury records and computers, another ordered that the administration could go ahead with dismantling USAID, according to the Associated Press.
DOGE has since moved to the Department of the Interior, cutting thousands of jobs and throwing national parks like Yosemite National Park into “staffing chaos,” according to NBC News.
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