“Ford is investing $11 billion to build electric vehicles, creating 11,000 jobs across the country. GM is making the largest investment in its history—$7 billion to build electric vehicles, creating 4,000 jobs in Michigan,” Biden said, offering only those two companies as evidence of American manufacturers investing in domestic production.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk was quick to notice the snub and took to Twitter to imply that his company has done much more for U.S. manufacturing than its rivals have.
“Tesla has created over 50,000 US jobs building electric vehicles & is investing more than double GM + Ford combined,” Musk said on Twitter, responding to a tweet from President Biden’s personal account.
Musk demanding attention from Biden is nothing new. The Biden administration’s neglect of Tesla has bothered the bombastic CEO for months.
In August, Musk said the administration was “not the friendliest” after a White House meeting with automakers excluded Tesla. Then, in January, Musk complained about his company being left out of an official White House video that promoted electric vehicles and featured GM CEO Mary Barra.