Tesla has become the last part of Elon Musk’s commercial empire to clarify that the criticisms of the CEO are unacceptable by firing a manager last month after having objected to a post on social media by Mr. Musk who referred to the Nazi leaders.
Jared Ottmann, a manager and engineer who worked with Tesla battery suppliers, said he was fired because he criticized Mr. Musk for a X post that used the names of the Nazis such as Heinrich Himmler and Hermann Göring in a series of words.
“Stop your enemies of Göring,” Musk wrote on January 23, adding, “bets you made a Nazi who arrived.” He dotted the pole with an EMOJI laughing.
Mr. Ottmann told LinkedIn in late January that he had been offended that Mr. Musk had reported “as a joke” to the Nazis who were responsible for the genocide.
“Starting from 2022 and especially in the last week I have raised the problem internally several times, with managers, human resources, legal conformities, relations with investors”, wrote Ottmann, referring to the behavior of Mr. Musk who found questionable. “And while in an overwhelming way, people offer personal support, Tesla as a company has remained silent.”
Tesla did not respond to a commentary request.
The companies of Mr. Musk, who include Spacex and X, have a history of punitive dissent. In 2022, Spacex, who made missiles, shot nine employees who had invited the company to distance himself from the comments on social media of Mr. Musk, including one in which he derided the accusations of sexual harassment against him. Some of these employees subsequently presented accusations of unfair practice with the National Labor Relations Board.
Ottmann’s critical observations and Tesla’s reaction are the last indication of the interruption caused by the right politics of Mr. Musk. He supported a far -right party in Germany whose members were fined by the government for using Nazi slogans. The role of Musk in the Trump administration as the leader of the government’s efficiency department has also made him a polarizing figure.
The signs of dissent in Tesla were not isolated to Mr. Ottmann. Last month during a meeting in the Tesla offices in Palo Alto, California, the employees vented their frustrations for the political activities of Mr. Musk, bringing a manager to say that he was also discouraged by the behavior of the CEO.
Mr. Ottmann confirmed Thursday that he was fired. He refused to comment further, referring to questions to Jana Moser, a lawyer in Santa Monica, California, Mrs. Moser did not respond to a commentary request.
This autumn, a Spacex employee was fired after writing on an internal bulletin board that hoped that Mr. Musk would stop wearing business clothing during the appearances of his campaign for Mr. Trump, said three people who are familiar with the accident. During an October event in Butler, Pennsylvania, for example, Mr. Musk wore a “Occupy Mars” shirt –while Spacex sells in his company-twentieth shop shop jumped up and down on stage.
The employee wrote that it would not be appropriate for workers to wear political clothes in the office and, therefore, that company clothing should not be worn during the campaign events. A few days after his assignment, the company revoked the employee’s access to the internal systems, although he later restored the employee after determining that there was no violation of corporate policies, people said.
The employee resigned weeks later. Spacex did not immediately respond to a commentary request.
Mr. Musk also fired the workers who criticized him. In the wake of its $ 44 billion acquisition of the company, then called Twitter, in 2022, several employees published criticisms of the billionaire on the platform. Mr. Musk discussed with some of them online, and later they were fired.
Fires are in contrast with Musk’s often declared goal to defend the freedom of speech. It was offered to finance legal actions against employers who shoot workers due to the things they published in X. In 2024, it financed a cause for an ex -worker to the blocking of the payments company after it was fired for inflammatory places that did on a pseudonym account X.
Tesla’s investors, the only listed company on the stock exchange that Musk manages, are also concerned that his political activities are alienating some buyers and that he is spending too much time in Washington and not enough time to face cars sales. The company’s shares decreased by about 40 percent from a high set on December 17th.