Written by Cláudio Afonso | LinkedIn | X
Tesla CEO Elon Musk lashed out at U.S. President Donald Trump’s trade adviser Peter Navarro on Tuesday, calling him “truly a moron” after Navarro questioned on Monday the automaker’s manufacturing credentials during an interview.
Navarro, speaking on CNBC, said Musk was “not a car manufacturer,” but rather “a car assembler,” citing Tesla’s reliance on imported components including batteries from China and Japan and electronics from Taiwan.
“But he’s not a car manufacturer,” Navarro said. “He’s a car assembler in many cases. If you go to his Texas plant, a good part of the engines that he gets—which in the EV case is the batteries—come from Japan and come from China. The electronics come from Taiwan.”
Musk, responding on X, the social media platform, wrote: “Navarro is truly a moron. What he says here is demonstrably false.”
President Donald Trump signed last week a 25% tariff on all foreign-made vehicles and auto parts, regardless of origin. Higher tariffs were imposed on EU, China and over 170 other countries and regions raising concerns of a global trade war.
Musk, who leads both Tesla and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), appeared in Florence, Italy, over the weekend at a rally hosted by the right-wing Lega party. In remarks on Saturday, he advocated for freer trade between Europe and North America.
“I’m hopeful, for example, with the tariffs, that at the end of the day, I hope it is agreed that both Europe and the United States should move ideally, in my view, to a zero tariff situation, effectively creating a free trade zone between Europe and North America,” Musk said. “That’s what I hope occurs.”
Musk did not explicitly comment on Trump’s proposed auto tariffs during the event, but said last week that Tesla would not be exempt from such duties, even though the company manufactures vehicles in the U.S., potentially limiting its exposure. Below is Musk’s statement at the conference.
Navarro previously served as director of the White House National Trade Council from 2017 to 2021, where he was a key advocate for Trump’s tariffs on $370 billion worth of Chinese imports and national security tariffs on steel and aluminum.