Tesla CEO Elon Musk has too much power as he advises President Donald Trump and spearheads efforts to slash the size of the federal government through his DOGE Service, Isaac Elias said Saturday.
It’s the reason Elias, 43, of Baden in Beaver County, helped organize a series of protests outside the Tesla dealership in Marshall.
On Saturday, he stood along Route 19 holding a sign that read, “We fight for your freedom.”
He was joined by dozens of other anti-Musk protesters, as well as pro-Musk counterprotesters.
Edward Walter, 68, of New Kensington said he felt Musk and Trump flouted laws and put constitutional rights at risk.
“As a veteran, I swore an oath to the Constitution,” he said. “I’m here to defend the freedom of speech.”
The weekly protest outside the dealership started six weeks ago, with about four people. It’s grown every week since, Elias said. Next week, he’s planning to start a similar protest outside a Tesla dealership in Bridgeville.
“We are ultimately trying to get back to how our government is supposed to work,” Elias said, citing concerns that the Trump administration is rolling back civil rights in a quest against diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives and yanking funding from key areas, like education.
The idea stemmed from something Elias saw on social media: #teslatakedown. Protesters across the country have been targeting Tesla dealerships as a place to voice their displeasure with Musk and Trump.
The protest in Marshall remained peaceful. Across the country, acts of vandalism have been committed at Tesla dealerships and charging stations.
Elias said he wants people to feel like they have a chance to come together and make their voices heard if they share his concerns about Musk’s role in the Trump administration.
“Since not everybody can go to D.C. or Harrisburg, we can come here,” he said.
But not everyone shares that view.
Darryl Wolfe, 55, of Ohioville in Beaver County, held American and pro-Trump flags in a show of support for the president and for Tesla.
He disagrees with the notion of targeting an American company that creates jobs for people in the United States.
“I understand some people may not like what’s going on, but you don’t try to destroy a company employing thousands of Americans,” he said.
Though Wolfe said he realizes some people feel differently, he applauds Musk’s work.
“The idea that making our government more streamlined is a bad thing doesn’t make sense to me,” he said. “We all have to live within our means. Why doesn’t our government?”
DOGE, which stands for Department of Government Efficiency, was tasked by the president with “eliminating waste, bloat, and insularity” throughout the federal government. Through DOGE, Trump and Musk have sought to cut spending and slash the federal workforce.
Val Candy, of Aliquippa said she’s glad Musk is “exposing waste in government.”
“I thought that was the goal,” she said.
Pro- and anti-Musk protesters at times fell into shouting matches along Route 19, arguing about whether Musk had overstepped, what constituted government waste and what spending cuts could mean for everyday Americans.
“If this was Biden, you wouldn’t be cool with this,” Elias hollered at a Musk supporter who had claimed the government was wasting millions through the U.S. Agency for International Development, or USAID, which Trump and Musk have proposed to cut drastically.
An employee at the Tesla dealership directed inquiries to a corporate media inbox, which did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Frank Spagnolo, who owns the nearby parking lot many protesters used Saturday, said he was on standby to protect his property and the vehicles another car dealership rents the lot to store.
“It’s slowly getting a lot worse,” he said of the weekly protests. “It’s ridiculous.”
While Spagnolo said everyone has a right to protest, he’s growing frustrated with protesters using his property as a staging area and parking lot. He plans to put up no-parking signs identifying the lot as private property.
Along the roadway in front of the Tesla dealership, people waved American flags, a Ukrainian flag, Trump flags and signs showing support or disapproval of Musk and Trump. Someone placed Trump yard signs in the grass.
“He’s just taking a hatchet to America,” Alison Huettner, 68, of Shadyside said of Musk. “And it’s just not okay.”
Weston Markham, 51, of Edgewood said he felt the spending cuts pushed by DOGE were inappropriate because Congress holds power over spending.
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“This is just plain corruption,” said Markham, who helped organize the protest.
Sue Free, 79, of Moon, raised concerns with DOGE’s efforts to access personal data, fire huge swaths of federal employees and dismantle government agencies.
“There are enough people who care enough to come out on a cold, rainy day and speak for their point of view,” she said. “That is democracy, which we hold dear.”
Her husband, John Free, said he wants people to understand what’s happening in the federal government.
“The ignorance is just abysmal,” he said. “Trump told us what he was going to do before the election, and they didn’t believe it or didn’t care. He’s broken every promise.”
Barb Blake, 69, of New Sewickley said she sees Musk as someone who has stepped in to fix ongoing problems.
“He’s been finding all this wasteful spending that’s been going on for years in this country,” she said.
Blake said she wanted to stand up against protesters who see Trump and Musk supporters as the enemy.
“We are not ruining democracy,” she said. “We’re in support of preserving our republic.”