Survey Sunday: do you still believe in Elon Musk?
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- Electrek ran a sidebar survey asking readers if they still believe in Musk's self-driving, robot-built, Mars-colonizing vision, collecting more than 3,000 responses and publishing results the week Musk became the world's first trillionaire.
- More than 67% of respondents said they don't trust Musk or don't trust him "with extreme prejudice," while roughly 13% still supported him and 17% said they "didn't know" about him.
- Critics blamed Musk for shutting down USAID through DOGE, with commenters citing estimates that 600,000 people will die from that decision alone and that stockpiled food and medicine went undistributed.
- Several readers pushed back on the idea that Musk was essential to EVs, arguing battery tech was advanced more by laptop and phone manufacturers and that Tesla's rise actually slowed broader BEV and charger adoption.
- A commenter cited Peter Thiel's characterization of Musk as "The Man Who Didn't Understand Risk," arguing Musk's success stems from reckless risk-taking, not genius, and that he has become "too big to fail" with X propped up by big banks.
- Even supportive respondents flagged "Elon Time" as a real pattern in which Musk eventually delivers on his ideas but his timelines are "a complete and utter fantasy."
Why it matters: For an EV-focused outlet's readership — Musk's natural base of support — to show 67% distrust suggests brand erosion among the most sympathetic consumers, not just headline-level controversy. Even the 13% still backing him flagged broken-promise timelines, a sharper concern for Tesla and SpaceX retention than abstract political backlash.
