Man charged with assault at Tesla dealership after driving car at protesters
A man was arrested and charged with assault for driving his car towards a crowd of people protesting outside a Florida Tesla dealership and narrowly avoiding them, authorities said.
Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office said deputies went to a planned protest at a West Palm Beach dealership on Saturday, where suspect Andrew Dutil drove onto the curb and slowly toward the protesters. There were no injuries.
"The protestors had to move out of the way in order to avoid being struck by the vehicle," the sheriff's office said in a statement.
Court records show Dutil, who is being held in Palm Beach County Jail, was charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon without intent to kill. It is not clear if he has retained a lawyer or when he is due to appear in court.
The Palm Beach Post reported that Dutil was driving a black Nissan SUV and that the crowd numbered more than 100.
"He drove into a crowd of senior citizens. Everybody was able to move out, but two older women were really almost clipped. We immediately called the cops," Mark Offerman, from the Democratic Progressive Caucus Palm Beach County, which organized the protest, told the newspaper.
Tesla did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The protest was one of several across the country in recent weeks to show opposition to Tesla founder Elon Musk's politics and actions at the Department of Government Efficiency. Since January, DOGE has slashed government costs and fired thousands of federal workers.
While some Republicans have cheered on his extreme methods, politicians and supporters of both parties have warned of the consequences of remaking the state in such a rapid, hardline way.
The Democratic Progressive Caucus Palm Beach County is planning to protest at the same West Palm Beach dealership every Saturday for the foreseeable future.
"Elon Musk is destroying our democracy, and he's using the fortune he built at Tesla to do it," the organizers wrote in a message advertising the demonstrations on an activist website.
It continued: "We are taking action at Tesla to stop Musk's illegal coup AND send a vital message to the American People: we will not surrender democracy to the Trump-Vance-Musk regime to benefit Russian President Vladimir Putin or any dictator or oligarch."
While many protests are peaceful, there have been at least 80 reported cases of vandalism and damage effecting Tesla vehicles and charging stations, including cars being and charging stations damaged. At least 10 dealerships have been affected.
The FBI said Friday that protesters were targeting Tesla vehicles and dealerships across the country "with arson, gunfire, and vandalism." But law enforcement officials and domestic terrorism said there was no evidence of coordination of the attacks.
The protests are having real-world consequences for Tesla. The company's stock price closed at $248.71 on Friday, having reached a 52-week high of $488.54 in December, although the price is higher than it was for much of 2024.
Musk spoke at a Tesla all-hands meeting last week and told his employees there are better days ahead. "Hang on to your stock," he urged his staff.
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