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Tesla Sues Over Shutdown as Musk Threatens California Exit; California Democrat Reacts to Tesla Lawsuit: ‘F— Elon Musk’

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By Bloomberg. Elon Musk lashed out at the California county blocking Tesla Inc. from reopening its only U.S. car plant, threatening to immediately relocate operations to other states and cease manufacturing at the factory.

Hours after the chief executive officer tweeted that Tesla would sue Alameda County, which didn’t allow the facility to resume operations Friday, the electric-car maker filed a complaint with the U.S. District Court in San Francisco. Tesla claims the county’s health order violates due process and “puts businesses deemed critical to the nation’s well-being by the federal and state governments between a rock and a hard place.”

Musk, who has called coronavirus-related shutdown orders fascist, said Tesla will decide whether to keep producing cars in Fremont, California, based on how it’s treated going forward. The Bay area was the first region in the country to implement stay-home orders to contain the spread of Covid-19 and has been cautious about lifting them.

(Read more from “Tesla Sues Over Shutdown as Musk Threatens California Exit” HERE)

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California Democrat Reacts to Tesla Lawsuit, Pullout Plan Over Coronavirus Rules: ‘F— Elon Musk’

By Fox News. A California Democrat seemed less than upset Saturday night at the news that entrepreneur Elon Musk planned to pull much of his company Tesla – along with an unspecified number of jobs — out of the state over coronavirus shutdown rules that have stalled the automaker’s operations.

Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez of San Diego appeared to be saying something along the lines of “Good riddance” – except she didn’t exactly use those words.

“F— Elon Musk,” was Gonzalez’s brief response on Twitter.

(Read more from “California Democrat Reacts to Tesla Lawsuit, Pullout Plan Over Coronavirus Rules: ‘F— Elon Musk’” HERE)

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Elon Musk Says There’s a Chance His AI-Brain-Chip Company Will Be Putting Implants in Humans Within a Year

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Neuralink, the AI-brain-chip company spearheaded by Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, could be ready to put a version of its implant in a person “within a year,” Musk said when recently speaking on Joe Rogan’s podcast.

Neuralink, which was founded in 2016, is Musk’s neural technology company that’s developing an implant designed to interface directly with the human brain. The initial goal of the implant, says Musk, is to use it as a means to treat brain injury and trauma.

“There’s still a lot of work to do,” Musk said when speaking with Rogan. “So when I say, you know, we’ve probably got a shot at putting it in a person, you know, within a year. I think, that’s exactly what I mean, I think we have a chance of putting input in one end, having them be healthy, and restoring some functionality that they’ve lost.”

The chip could potentially be used to restore eyesight, hearing, and limb movement in addition to addressing diseases that affect the brain, Musk claims. The device would be implanted directly into the skull to enable electrode threads to interface with certain areas of the brain, according to Musk. (Read more from “Elon Musk Says There’s a Chance His AI-Brain-Chip Company Will Be Putting Implants in Humans Within a Year” HERE)

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Tesla’s Elon Musk Rails Against Government Coronavirus Mandates

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Elon Musk summed up his feeling and “outrage” about the government-mandated U.S. coronavirus closings and restrictions every American is dealing with as “fascist” during a cuss-filled rant on the company’s earnings call Wednesday evening.

“The extent of shelter in place or frankly what I would call it forcibly imprisoning people in their homes is against all their constitutional rights…and erasing peoples freedoms in ways that are horrible and wrong and not why people came to America or built this country, what the f–k,” Musk lamented before excusing himself for the curse. “It will cause great harm not just to Tesla but to many companies and while Tesla will weather the storm, there are many small companies that will not” he warned. “Everything that people worked for their whole life is being destroyed in real-time.”

An order in the six-county San Francisco Bay Area, where the carmaker conducts the bulk of its production, forced Tesla to close that plant starting March 23 to help prevent the virus’s spread, and it was extended until the end of May. . .

That prompted Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn to fire off her own rebuttal bashing the billionaire.

(Read more from “Tesla’s Elon Musk Rails Against Government Coronavirus Mandates” HERE)

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Elon Musk Says He’s Surprised That ‘CNN Still Exists’ After Article Alleges He Didn’t Deliver Promised Ventilators

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Tesla CEO Elon Musk tweeted he’s surprised that “CNN still exists” Thursday while disputing a report that claimed the California governor’s office had not received ventilators he promised to send.

Musk announced last month that he had obtained over 1,000 ventilators in an effort to help California hospitals amid the novel coronavirus pandemic. Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office allegedly said they have yet to receive Musk’s ventilators, according to CNN’s report. . .

The Tesla CEO then tweeted at Newsom asking him to “fix this misunderstanding” and followed it up with receipts that appeared to prove he had, in fact, sent the ventilators over. The receipt shows email correspondence between Musk and Phillip Franks, LA County Health Services’ Director of System Operations and Support Services. . .

A follow-up email from Tesla’s Project Director Omead Afshar on March 30 indicates that the Tesla team asked if “these ventilators went into use.”

Musk also included a screenshot that appears to be from Mammoth Hospital, a general hospital in Mammoth Lakes, California. The email thanked Musk for the ventilators and was signed by CEO Tom Parker. (Read more from “Elon Musk Says He’s Surprised That ‘Cnn Still Exists’ After Article Alleges He Didn’t Deliver Promised Ventilators” HERE)

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Tesla Plans to Supply FDA-Approved Ventilators Free of Cost; Texas ‘Mom and Pop’ Business Flooded With Orders for Helmet Ventilators

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By Reuters. Tesla Inc (TSLA.O) Chief Executive Elon Musk said on Tuesday the company has extra FDA-approved ventilators that can be shipped free of cost to hospitals within regions where the electric carmaker delivers.

“Device & shipping cost are free. Only requirement is that the vents are needed immediately for patients, not stored in a warehouse. Please me or @Tesla know,” Musk said in a tweet. . .

Tesla did not immediately respond to a request for comment on how many ventilators it has to offer, or how the company will prioritize requests. (Read more from “Tesla Plans to Supply FDA-Approved Ventilators Free of Cost” HERE)

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Texas ‘Mom and Pop’ Business Flooded With Orders for Helmet Ventilators Amid Coronavirus Crisis

By NBC News. One month ago, Chris Austin was running a little-known mom-and-pop business in Texas that fielded a few dozen orders a week for his helmet-style ventilation devices. . .

Austin’s company, Sea-Long Medical Systems Inc., is getting thousands of orders every day, from America’s top hospitals to countries as far flung as the United Arab Emirates. Researchers say the device, which costs less than $200, could help hospitals free up ventilators for only the most critically ill coronavirus patients.

“‘Overwhelmed’ doesn’t scratch the surface,” Austin told NBC News.

The demand for the Sea-Long helmet underscores the dire shortage of ventilators in the U.S. and around the globe fueled by a surge in hospital patients suffering from COVID-19.

In the last few weeks, hospitals have been flooded with patients experiencing respiratory problems so severe they need the help of a machine to help them breathe. (Read more from “Texas ‘Mom and Pop’ Business Flooded With Orders for Helmet Ventilators Amid Coronavirus Crisis” HERE)

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Court Orders Tesla to Stop Cutting Down Trees

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Elon Musk’s Tesla has been ordered to stop clearing forest land near the capital of Berlin, Germany, to build its new “Gigafactory.”

Reuters reports that a German court has ordered Tesla to stop cutting down trees in a forest near the capital of Berlin to make room for its first European “Gigafactory.” The electric vehicle maker announced plans last November to build a factory in Gruenheide, located in the eastern state of Brandenburg.

The ruling by the higher administrative court of the states of Berlin and Brandenburg comes shortly after the state environmental office gave Tesla permission to clear 92 hectares of forest to make room for the new manufacturing plant. However, the planning permission for the factory had not yet been granted meaning that preparing the ground for the factory was done at the company’s own risk. (Read more from “Court Orders Tesla to Stop Cutting Down Trees” HERE)

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Jury Sides with Elon Musk in ‘Pedo Guy’ Defamation Lawsuit

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By Washington Examiner. A Los Angeles jury ruled against British cave diver Vernon Unsworth in his defamation lawsuit against Elon Musk.

Unsworth filed a lawsuit against Musk after the two clashed over the best way to help a young soccer team escape a flooded cave in Thailand last year.

Musk had pitched several prototypes of submarines that could be used to rescue the boys. Unsworth, however, claimed that Musk “had no conception of what the cave passage was like” and argued that his efforts to help the boys was only a public relations stunt to help his two companies, Tesla and SpaceX. (Read more from “Jury Sides with Elon Musk in ‘Pedo Guy’ Defamation Lawsuit” HERE)
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By Lora Kolodny. Unsworth brought the suit against Musk in September 2018, after the Tesla and SpaceX CEO had called him “sus” (suspicious) and a “pedo guy” on Twitter earlier that summer. Musk also characterized the spelunker as a “child rapist” in e-mails to Buzzfeed reporter Ryan Mac, and practically requested the lawsuit in August 2018 with a tweet that said, “Don’t you think it’s strange he hasn’t sued me?”

In his testimony during the defamation trial this week, Musk apologized to Unsworth and said he did not believe the cave explorer was a pedophile.

Musk and his defense team, led by attorney Alex Spiro, argued that “pedo guy” was simply heated rhetoric and not meant as a statement of fact. They also argued that the phrase “pedo guy” is widely known as slang for “creepy old guy.” And they suggested that Unsworth was looking for a payday in court, and had not sincerely been harmed by the “pedo guy” label.

The clash between the two men began when Unsworth criticized Musk for involving himself, and his employees, in an effort to rescue 12 boys and their soccer coach from flooded caves in Thailand in July 2018.

Unsworth’s expertise and knowledge of the caves proved instrumental in extracting the soccer team. He is credited as being a leader of the rescue effort. (Read more about the defamation lawsuit against Musk HERE)

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Elon Musk ‘Pedo Guy’ Defamation Trial Begins

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The Defamation lawsuit against Tesla CEO Elon Musk begins today in Los Angeles. The case is based on Musk’s social media posts calling British cave rescuer Vern Unsworth, who was instrumental in the rescue of a trapped Thai youth soccer team, a ‘Pedo Guy.’

Yahoo News reports that Tesla CEO and SpaceX founder Elon Musk is set to go to trial on Tuesday after he accused British cave rescuer Vernon Unsworth of being a pedophile. Unsworth played a major role in the rescue of 12 boys and their soccer coach from Tham Luang Nang Non cave in Thailand in July 2018, during the incident Unsworth criticized Musk’s plan to use a miniature submarine to save the boys labeling it a publicity stunt. In response, Musk called him a “pedo guy” on Twitter.

Now, Unsworth claims that Musk should pay punitive and other damages for harming his reputation. The trial will be before U.S. District Judge Stephen Wilson in Los Angeles and is scheduled to take place over five days. Musk is expected to testify in his own defense.

Musk boasts 29.8 million Twitter followers and his account has become a major source of publicity for his companies including Tesla, which prides itself on not spending money excessively on marketing campaigns. Now Musk’s Twitter habits have once again landed him in hot water, after a tweet in 2018 about taking Tesla private cost him and the company millions in SEC fines. . .

In the defamation case, Unsworth must prove that Musk did not use reasonable care to determine if the claims made in his tweets were true and that members of the public understood them to mean that he was accusing Unsworth of being a pedophile. It was ruled last month that Unsworth’s sudden fame due to the rescue did not make him a “public figure” which meant that he did not need to demonstrate the higher standard of proof that Musk acted with “actual malice” when posting the tweets. (Read more from “Elon Musk ‘Pedo Guy’ Defamation Trial Begins” HERE)

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Ford Backs Away from Tesla Tug-Of-War, but Musk Is Doing It Anyway

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Ford executive Sunny Madra tweeted a challenge to Tesla CEO Elon Musk on Monday for a rematch of a tug-of-war Tesla conducted between its electric Cybertruck and an F-150 that has been criticized by many, including Neil deGrasse Tyson, for being unfairly matched, to which Elon Musk replied: “Bring it on”.

However, when asked if Tesla had reached out to Ford to set up a competition, a Ford spokeswoman said “Sunny’s tweet was tongue in cheek to point out the absurdity of Tesla’s video, nothing more.”

“With America’s best-selling truck for 42 years, we’ve always focused on serving our truck customers regardless of what others say or do. We look forward to our all-new F-150 hybrid coming next year and all-electric F-150 in a few years,” she added.

Nevertheless, Musk agreed to do right by deGrasse Tyson’s suggestion that the heavier weight of the battery-powered Cybertruck gave it a traction advantage and that Musk should level the playing field and repeat the test.

(Read more from “Ford Backs Away from Tesla Tug-Of-War, but Musk Is Doing It Anyway” HERE)

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Elon Musk: Here’s Why World Population Will Start to Collapse Soon

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By Breitbart. SpaceX and Tesla CEO Elon Musk reiterated a theory on Friday that he’s promoted in the past: that the world is not only not heading rapidly toward an unsustainable population by mid-century, but it’s also poised for a population collapse.

In a tweet noted by Business Insider, the billionaire PayPal co-founder, responding to a post by World of Engineering citing a projected world population of 9,346,399,468 by 2050, refuted the warnings of overpopulation.

“1950 (historical) world population – 2,556,000,053,” World of Engineering tweeted Thursday. “Current world population – 7,712,343,478[;] 2050 (projected) world population – 9,346,399,468.”

“Real issue will [be] an aging & declining world population by 2050, *not* overpopulation,” Musk responded. “[Jørgen] Randers estimate far more accurate than UN imo,” Musk added, linking to a Wikipedia article containing several population projections, including by Randers.

In a follow-up tweet, Musk agreed with a follower that the population will be an “inverse pyramid,” writing: “Yes, demographics, stratified by age, will look like an upside down pyramid with many old people & fewer young.”

(Read more from “Elon Musk: Here’s Why World Population Will Start to Collapse Soon” HERE)

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Elon Musk Says SpaceX Will Try Its ‘Most Difficult Launch Ever’

By Business Insider. Elon Musk, the founder and CEO of SpaceX, said his rocket company’s toughest mission yet has arrived — and you can watch it live online.

At 2:30 a.m. ET on Tuesday, a Falcon Heavy rocket lifted off from Cape Canaveral, Florida.

This morning’s launch attempt marks SpaceX’s third-ever with Falcon Heavy. The rocket design debuted in February 2018, has three reusable boosters, and is considered the planet’s most powerful launch system in use today.

What makes this mission, called Space Test Program-2 (STP-2), so challenging is what’s stacked inside the rocket’s nose cone: 24 government and commercial satellites that together weigh about 8,150 pounds (3,700 kilograms). When fully fueled, a Falcon Heavy rocket weighs about 1,566 tons (1,420 metric tons), or more than 300 adult elephants’ worth of mass. (Read more from “Elon Musk Says SpaceX Will Try Its ‘Most Difficult Launch Ever'” HERE)

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