"Tesla Takedown" movement plans mass protests amid U.S. crackdown

Driving the news: More than 200 protests are planned at Tesla locations in the U.S. Saturday, organizers announced earlier this month.

• They also aim for a target of 500 demonstrations around the world.

The big picture: "Elon Musk is destroying our democracy, and he's using the fortune he built at Tesla to do it," the movement's website stated, urging supporters to take action to stop "Musk's illegal coup."

• The movement urges further actions against Musk's flagship company, imploring people to sell their Teslas and dump the company's stock.
• "No one is coming to save us. Not politicians, not the media, not the courts," the website stated.
• The movement emphasizes that it is nonviolent in nature and that the demonstrations are exercises of freedom of assembly.

The big picture: #TeslaTakedown protests have been bubbling up across the country since the start of President Trump's second term.

• Musk's involvement in the administration have made some Tesla investors uneasy as the company's stock price has plummeted.
• Incidents of vandalism in several states led Attorney General Pam Bondi to threaten "severe consequences" for anyone involved.

• Bondi and Trump called the incidents "domestic terrorism," and the president suggested that people responsible for them be sent to El Salvador to serve prison sentences.

What they're saying: "I think a great wrong is being done to the people of Tesla and to our customers," Musk told Fox News in an interview Thursday night.

• Musk said people "committing violence" against the company after being "fed propaganda by the far-left."
• He also said people funding the protests were "the real villains," even more so than the people committing the destructive acts.

Go deeper: What to know about the #TeslaTakedown movement targeting Elon Musk and DOGE