Around 800 anti-capitalist protesters assembled at Tesla’s Gigafactory plant in Grueneheide, Germany on Friday to oppose its expansion, and the negative environmental impacts of Tesla production.
Suffice it to say, CEO Elon Musk wasn’t too happy.
“The fight against this car factory is a fight against every car factory,” said Ole Becker, a spokesperson for the organizing group Disrupt, in a press release on the coalition’s website.
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In a press release published Friday, the organizing coalition Disrupt, claimed the factory was built illegally, and asserts that plans for its expansion would damage the surrounding forests, and have been opposed by local residents. Over 60 percent of residents opposed the 50 hectare expansion of the massive facility in a vote in February, according to Wired. A group of protesters have been camping in the woods ever since.
According to Reuters, the group also wished to bring attention to the high environmental cost of mining lithium, which is used to make batteries for electric cars. Lithium mining pollutes the air, water, and soil with harmful chemicals and heavy metals in countries around the world.
On Friday, protesters gathered from across Germany for an organized push against the facility, which was met with substantial police resistance.
One video of the protest posted to X shows dozens of people chaotically surging around police officers, toward the facility. CEO Elon Musk responded to the video, clarifying that protesters had not breached the fences around the factory. He didn't stop there, though.
It seems that Musk could not wrap his head around why any environmentalist would protest the production of his lithium-reliant electric cars. “Something super weird is going on, as Tesla was the *only* car company attacked,” Musk wrote.
He also whined that the protesters were not treated harshly enough by law enforcement. “Why do the police let the left-wing protestors off so easily?” he wrote on X.
Meanwhile, Becker told CNN that he witnessed a lot of police violence at the protest, and a video posted to X showed police pepper spraying the protesters as they ran. Several protesters were taken into custody, and a few were injured, police said.
Read it at Reuters
