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Michigan argues Tesla “never sought the ability to directly sell” within state
Michigan officials have filed a response to a Tesla federal lawsuit which alleges that the state has unfairly denied the Silicon Valley-based electric car company from selling cars within the state. At issue is a “Anti-Tesla” amendment that prevents the company’s effort to “sell and service its critically-acclaimed, all-electric vehicles at Tesla-owned facilities” in that state.
The state says they have an entirely different interpretation and call Tesla’s version “incorrect.” Michigan requires that vehicles must be sold through a franchised dealer. Today’s state response includes Michigan’s argument that Tesla “has never sought the ability to directly sell its vehicles in Michigan but only licenses to operate dealerships.”
In an email to The Detroit News today, Tesla said, “If it’s the state’s position that Tesla can sell its cars directly to consumers, Tesla welcomes that opportunity and invites the state to work with us so that we can start serving our customers in Michigan as soon as possible.”
Of course, the Big Three automakers — General Motors, Ford Motor Company, and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles US— have their headquarters in the Detroit area.
An October 2014 Michigan state law bans automakers from selling vehicles directly to consumers. The Michigan Legislature, backed by the state’s new-car dealership lobby, voted strongly in favor of the amendment, which has come to be known as the “anti-Tesla” bill. Many believe that the law was intended to close a loophole that Tesla has used in other states to maintain company-owned retail stores and bypass the dealership route. Tesla’s complaint outlines that the “only conceivable reason” for the law is “to reward the dealers’ generous lobbying efforts by handing them a monopoly.”
Tesla seeks two things in its lawsuit. To start, it is asking for a declaratory judgment that Michigan’s ban on direct-sales violates the Due Process, Equal Protection, and Commerce Clauses of the Constitution as applied to Tesla. The law, Tesla says, prohibits it from selling its vehicles directly to consumers, and it also precludes Tesla from performing service and repairs within the State. Moreover, Tesla wants a permanent injunction preventing state officials from enforcing the law, including the October 2014 amendment.
What’s the state’s retort? The state argues a 2000 state law would not have allowed Tesla to sell its vehicles, and Tesla wasn’t incorporated until three years later. “The statutory scheme that plaintiff claims discriminates against plaintiff has existed in its current form since before plaintiff existed as a company,” the state says in its response.
The Michigan Secretary of State’s office had denied Tesla’s new-dealership license request in September. The governor had declared that the law “clarifies and strengthens” an existing long-standing prohibition of new car direct sales in Michigan. Soon after, on September 22, 2016, Tesla filed the lawsuit in federal court in western Michigan against three individuals: Governor Rick Snyder, Michigan Secretary of State Ruth Johnson, and Attorney General Bill Schuette. The state contends that none of these individuals has “violated any of plaintiff’s constitutional rights, or any rights whatsoever.”
Earlier this month, Tesla opened a Troy gallery showroom, housed within a Nordstrom department store. With an artistic atmosphere, the 700-square-foot space includes a Model X SUV for consumers to scrutinize. However, no sales can be made at the site. Instead, customers must head online for product details and ordering information.
Governor Snyder commented about the Tesla-Nordstrom gallery with a politician’s finesse. “That’s a legal issue that I’ve said would be a good topic for the Legislature to look at, to say what about new manufacturers and those issues. I would encourage our Legislature to look at (Tesla’s gallery surrogate showroom) when they deem appropriate.”
Tesla is requesting a jury trial.
“Tesla will continue to fight for the rights of Michigan consumers to be able to choose how they buy cars in Michigan. Giving auto dealers a monopoly on car sales benefits them, but harms consumers,” said Tesla in a statement.
For years, there have been images and videos across social media platforms that have reminded me of when I was a 15-year-old kid teased by “Xbox 720” videos on YouTube. These videos are of the supposed “Tesla Phone” that Elon Musk was secretly developing in between leading Tesla with its electric cars and SpaceX with its reusable rockets.
Would you buy a Tesla phone ? pic.twitter.com/aaTwvvIJit
— Tesla Owners Silicon Valley (@teslaownersSV) October 6, 2023
Although Musk has put those rumors to bed several times, it was never completely out of the realm that he could get involved in cell phones in some capacity. Think outside the box and more macro-level, though. Instead of reinventing the computer, Musk reinvented connectivity by developing Starlink with SpaceX.
It could be something similar, TD Cowen analyst Gregory Williams said in a note last week, where he hinted SpaceX could be gathering some steam to acquire T-Mobile.
Williams said it would be the “clear choice” for SpaceX if it decided to go through with a network acquisition. He also suggested AT&T.
The move would be possible through selling more of its own stock, which would help SpaceX raise the money to purchase T-Mobile, which would cost roughly $300 billion. It could be one of the moves SpaceX makes post-IPO in terms of an acquisition: it already acquired Cursor AI for $60 billion.
Other analysts, like Dan Ives of Wedbush, believe SpaceX and Tesla will eventually merge into one anyway, and that conglomeration could come as soon as this year, some have said.
The implications of SpaceX purchasing T-Mobile are massive. A combined entity would create a truly ubiquitous network: T-Mobile’s terrestrial 5G towers and Starlink’s growing constellation of Direct-to-Cell satellites. This would essentially eliminate dead zones across the U.S. and potentially globally.
SpaceX would instantly become a full-scale facilities-based carrier with satellite differentiation; a huge advantage. This would pressure AT&T and Verizon heavily.
There are also concerns like a potential reduction in long-term competition, and of course, a deal of that size would face intense scrutiny from government agencies.
The strategic fit is compelling due to the existing Starlink–T-Mobile partnership and complementary technologies (space + terrestrial). It could create a dominant integrated communications player. However, the regulatory, financial, and execution hurdles are enormous — this remains highly speculative with no indication SpaceX is actively pursuing it right now.
Tesla revealed a major new Cybercab detail in a guide it released for First Responders, showing new territory in its beliefs and intentions for the ride-hailing-focused vehicle that entered production in April.
The First Responders Guide is released to give fire departments, paramedics, and other emergency personnel the proper guidance on what to do in the event of an accident, entrapment, or other situation that would require immediate attention.
On one of the pages of the First Responders Guide, Tesla revealed a stark detail about the Cybercab, which could help personnel enter the vehicle more easily in case of an emergency.
Tesla Cybercab has one important piece that AI4 cars might need for FSD
It shows Tesla has no intention of releasing any Cybercab units that were initially proposed for ride-hailing services for the general public with any manual controls, meaning a steering wheel or pedals:
“A Cybercab equipped with steering wheel, brake pedal, and an acceleration pedal is typically an engineering or test vehicle, and operates at SAE Level 2 autonomy. Cybercab is not typically equipped with a steering wheel or acceleration and brake pedals.”
New official Cybercab documentation from Tesla:
“A Cybercab equipped with steering wheel, brake pedal, and an acceleration pedal is typically an engineering or test vehicle, and operates at SAE Level 2 autonomy. Cybercab is not typically equipped with a steering wheel or… https://t.co/P6ut1mZyzr pic.twitter.com/yq6skl9s2J
— Sawyer Merritt (@SawyerMerritt) June 27, 2026
This is a major development for those who continue to believe Tesla planned to release the Cybercab with any sort of manual controls so that passengers could take over if needed. However, when Tesla started manufacturing production versions of the Cybercab in Giga Texas earlier this year, they were spotted without a steering wheel or pedals.
It essentially confirms the company has no intentions of bringing manual controls to the car’s production versions. Some have argued that the likelihood of Tesla having something
There still are some Cybercab units out there with a steering wheel and pedals, and as Tesla said, these cars are engineering or test vehicles, which have Safety Monitors on board to help the car out of a precarious situation or emergency.
Tesla released the Full Self-Driving v14 ‘Lite’ suite to owners of Hardware 3 or AI3 vehicles today, adding several new features to the vehicles that were once believed to be capable of unsupervised self-driving.
Now, Tesla has released this modified suite to older Tesla vehicles, adding plenty of new features and capabilities.
Here are the full release notes for the suite:
- Distilled the intelligence from HW4 V14 into HW3. This allows HW3 to directly learn how to handle scenarios using HW4 V14 as a guide. This process unlocks the improvements that have been made to HW4 including Reinforcement Learning (RL) and offline models for HW3.
- Improved both proactive and reactive responsiveness across a wide variety of categories including navigation handling, merges and forks, pedestrian interactions, traffic lights, and vehicle cut-in scenarios.
- Improved general comfort in nominal scenarios through fewer false slowdowns, smoother steering and more consistent lane centering.
- Introduced parking, unparking, and reversing capabilities.
- Added Arrival Options for you to select where FSD should park: in a Parking Lot, on the Street, in a Driveway, or at the Curbside.
- Speed Profiles are now available at all times, to further customize driving style preference.
These improvements, according to Tesla’s Head of AI, Ashok Elluswamy, help distill the driving behavior from AI4’s v14 series into both the camera and compute configurations of AI3.
Tesla Full Self-Driving v14 ‘Lite’ for older cars finally gets released
He added:
“It includes destination options and speed profiles on city roads, but more importantly significantly improved safety. We hope you’ll enjoy it, once the build ships wide.”
FSD v14 Lite is now rolling out to AI3 early-access customers. Based on the feedback, will rollout to more customers over the next few weeks.
This build distills the driving behavior from AI4’s v14 series into both the camera and compute config of AI3. It includes destination…
— Ashok Elluswamy (@aelluswamy) June 29, 2026
Tesla will continue to roll out the v14 Lite suite more widely in the coming weeks, the company said.
Tesla Phone? Not quite, but close: analyst
Tesla reveals huge Cybercab detail in new guide for First Responders
