Rachel Maddow on her primetime show Thursday night connected tanking Tesla sales overseas to its billionaire CEO’s own plummeting polling numbers in the United States – and the MSNBC host relished in the new developments.
The moment came Thursday during the opening monologue of Maddow’s primetime show – now on five nights a week for the first few months of the Trump administration – when she highlighted car sales in France falling last month.
“You know who it really, really sucks for?” Maddow asked. “It really sucks for Tesla.”
She went on to explain that “while car sales in France are down by 6%, sales of Teslas in France are down by 63% – not 6% – but 63%.”
“Oooh, I wonder why that is? France is the second largest market for electric cars in all of Europe, so that's really bad for Tesla,” she reiterated.
But Maddow quickly connected what could be interpreted as a clue while teasing viewers: “Weird, right? I wonder why that is?”
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She next referenced new public polling data from an Economist/YouGov poll that showed support among Republicans for Elon Musk falling sharply by 21 points – from 47% just after the November election – to 26% this week.
“We're now down to only about one in four Republicans wants Elon Musk to have a lot of involvement in the U.S. government,” Maddow said. “That’s just dropped like a stone in a very quick period of time.”
Support for Musk dropped even more significantly when Democrats and independents were asked whether they wanted Musk to have “a lot” of influence in the federal government.
“That proportion among Americans who are Democrats is 6% the proportion among Americans who are Independents is 6%,” Maddow said. “6%. I mean he's polling at like tooth-decay levels. That's like funny bone banged into something sharp levels.”
Watch the clip below or at this link:
