Tesla Investors Call for Elon Musk to Be Suspended Due To Antisemitic behavior

Tesla shareholders have condemned Elon Musk for his antisemitic behavior. This is due to his behavior on his social media platform, X, and other media outlets this Thursday. Following the incident, several investors have publicly called for his suspension. According to Bloomberg, the investors now want Elon Musk to be away from Tesla, one of the companies that he has helped to build and make a success. In addition to Tesla’s shareholders, Apple also took an action over Musk by pausing ads on X. The reasons are exactly the same, the free hate-speech being spread on X. (Source).

The backlash raised after Musk endorsed a tweet saying Jewish Community push “hatred against whites”. He said the tweet was “the actual truth”, and proceeded to attack the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), a civil rights group advocating against antisemitism.

Elon Musk faces a huge backlash due to his actions on X

Jerry Braakman, CIO at First American Trust, which held about 16,000 Tesla shares as of September 30, stated: “There is no excuse for the spreading of hatred by any CEO of any publicly traded company. He added “Tesla’s board should place him on leave for a month or two”.

Other tech leaders are also speaking out to condemn Musk’s actions. Apple plans to pause advertising on X, according to an Axios report Friday. Lionsgate will also reportedly cease its ads on the social media platform over the remarks. The two join IBM, which pulled advertising off the platform after it ran next to Nazi content. Furthermore, Facebook Cofounder Dustin Moskovitz went a step further and called for Elon Musk to resign from all his companies in a post on Threads Wednesday.

Tesla’s investors are furious with Elon Musk’s conduct, However, they want to remain investing at Tesla

There are dozens of investors growing upset with Musk’s recent comments. However, few of them are divesting from the electric car company. Despite the controversies, the shares of Tesla rose approximately 10% this week, despite falling slightly on Thursday.

Kristin Hull, founder and CEO of Nia Impact Capital, a social-impact fund that owned $282,000 of Tesla stock in 2023, said she was “appalled” after Musk’s endorsement of antisemitism. The lack of “serious punitive action” from Tesla’s board is a concern for Hull, and her fund suggests an appropriate reaction would be “censure by the Board, demotion, re-assignement, suspension, or even removal”.

Another Tesla investor, Ross Gerber stated “I’ve never had this with any company I’ve ever invested in ever in my life”. Gerber is the CEO of Gerber Kawasaki Wealth & Investment Management, which owed 400,000 shares of Tesla at the end of September.  He added “It’s absolutely outrageous, his behavior and the damage he’s done to the brand”. In addition to his displeasure, Gerber stated he would be replacing his Tesla with a Rivian next year. To those unaware, Rivian also produces electric cars and acts as a Tesla competitor in this growing market.

The timing was bad

Even the White House has condemned Musk for promoting “antisemitic and racist hate”, on Friday. The White House spokesperson Andrew Bates notes his behavior comes one month after the deadliest day for the Jewish people since the Holocaust. It was The October 7th Hamas attack on Israel.

Just as the other controversies that are surrounding Musk since his takeover at Twitter (now X), this one remains without a proper action taken by the leader. Musk keeps making “enemies” in the digital world due to the issues involving X, which stands as one of the largest social media networks available. However, it could soon lose its relevance due to the amount of hits it has been taking since the takeover. X lost a good portion of its advertisers which means a significant drop in revenue. Now, Tesla may also face the consequences of Musk’s actions on the social media.

At the time of this writing, the executive is yet to make an official statement about the criticism.