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Ford seemingly denies Tesla’s existence as it supports CA’s zero-emissions initiative
A recent press conference from California Governor Gavin Newsom proved to be quite interesting for the Tesla and electric car community. During his speech, where he praised California’s place as the leader in the United States’ electric vehicle movement, the governor dubbed veteran automaker Ford as the leader in the EV sector. Even more interestingly, the CA governor seemed almost intent to leave Tesla out when he was speaking about the state’s EV milestones.
The governor’s speech was shared on Twitter by Ford COO Jim Farley, who noted that the veteran carmaker is the only American automaker to stand behind California in its efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. This statement promptly raised some eyebrows and sarcastic jokes from the online EV community, considering that Tesla, an all-American automaker, has been mass-producing zero-emissions cars in the state for years. The fact that there was a Model 3 parked beside a Ford Mustang Mach-E during the speech was just icing on the cake.
“I want to thank in particular a number of automobile manufacturers that get it and are starting to get it done, led by Bill Ford and Ford. They have been a leader in this space. They’re not a laggard, and they’re not willing to just suffer the fate of a future of dirtier air, dirtier water, and more climate disruption. They want to lead and they are leading with innovation and an entrepreneurial mindset that’s leading to more customer choice, that’s leading to new technological advancements, and allow them to be on the vanguard of leadership, not just in the United States as a manufacturer, but around the rest of the world,” the governor said.
As noted by tech YouTuber and EV advocate Jeremy Judkins, things get even more interesting when one looks at the governor’s statements before his comments on Ford’s EV leadership. Newsom highlighted that California has 34 manufactures of electric vehicles, and he also remarked that EVs represent the second-largest export of the state. The governor added that the market caps of the publicly-traded electric car makers in California stand at nearly half a trillion dollars.
“Currently today, the state has 34 manufacturers of electric vehicles. No state in America comes close. This state represents just shy of 50% of all the electric vehicle purchases in the United States of America. We have, by one estimate, close to three-quarters of a million electric vehicles in the State of California — 726,000 at last count— no state comes close. Our second-largest export, rather, in the State of California is electric vehicles.
“Those 34 manufacturers represent — those publicly traded manufacturers — represent close to one half a trillion dollars of market capitalization. Some $500 billion. This is an economic opportunity, the opportunity to transform our economy across sectors, the opportunity to accelerate innovation in the entrepreneurial spirit, the opportunity to bring more companies here into the State of California, creating more jobs,” Newsom said.
It should be noted that Tesla represents the lion’s share of the EV exports that the California governor was referring to. The company also represents the majority of the combined $500 billion market cap of the state’s electric car makers, considering that Tesla currently has a market cap of about $360 billion on its own. These figures, as well as the presence of a literal Tesla just a few feet away from Newsom’s podium, made the governor’s speech rather peculiar on its own.
Granted, Ford could probably justify its statements by claiming that Tesla is not a pure automaker, but a tech company per se. Still, the rather discrete denial of the electric car maker’s existence in an event about reducing greenhouse gas emissions is still quite strange nonetheless. That being said, Ford could not claim to be a purely American carmaker either, considering that some of the vehicles it sells in the country are produced in foreign territories. The Mustang Mach-E, for example, will be made in Ford’s Cuautitlán Izcalli, Mexico plant, making the vehicle not quite as “American” as its competitor, the Tesla Model Y, which is produced in California.
Tesla is ending Cybertruck production sometime in mid-2027, according to CEO Elon Musk.
Musk made the announcement on X last night, which came as a shock to many. He said that the Cybertruck will end production “to make room for increased Cybercab production” at Gigafactory Texas.
It is a huge blow to the fans of Tesla who have come to love the Cybertruck and identify with it as a symbol of their fandom. It has been the best-selling electric pickup, but it has had an underwhelming sales performance in terms of what was expected. This is mostly due to Tesla not meeting the prices it planned to offer the Cybertruck, as its unveiling and actual release were four years apart.
Tesla will be winding down production of the Cybertruck at Gigafactory Texas around the middle of next year to make room for increased Cybercab production
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 6, 2026
Overall, the responses were mixed. Some fans understood the move toward Cybercab production, especially as Tesla is truly pushing the autonomous future through its Robotaxi platform. However, others did not understand it.
“Damn, how many Cybercabs do you guys need?” one response read. Another said it was “Sad but understandable.”Even analyst Gary Black had responded to the news, stating he hoped Tesla planned to replace it with a traditional pickup design.
It doesn’t seem like that will be the case.
Tesla is so hell-bent on delivering autonomy and eventually providing a driverless service that owning a car seems like an arbitrary idea, according to their thesis. Instead, Cybercabs will be available to pick you up and drop you off on demand, safely, without any human help.
As a result, Tesla has thinned its lineup considerably, and one can only ask where the vehicle lineup goes from here. Eventually, it seems like Cybercab could be the only vehicle that Tesla will sell.
Elon Musk
SpaceX’s next Starship flight set to make history on Friday the 13th
SpaceX is targeting Friday, November 13 for Starship Flight 15 and its first ship catch.
SpaceX is targeting Friday, November 13 for Starship Flight 15, the mission the company plans to use for its first attempt at catching the ship itself with the launch tower.
SpaceX Vice President of Launch Kiko Dontchev shared the date on stage at the UP.Summit on Thursday, according to Ars Technica’s Eric Berger, who was in attendance. It is the first launch target to come directly from a SpaceX executive. Until now, the public schedule had relied on FAA air traffic planning slides, which listed Flight 15 for no earlier than November 8 and later November 12. SpaceX has not posted an official mission page yet, and no launch time has been shared.
The date lands inside the window Elon Musk sketched out last month. Speaking at Giga Texas on October 10, Musk said the flight would “probably launch a little bit before Thanksgiving,” as Teslarati reported. On SpaceX’s third quarter earnings call ten days later, he confirmed that Flight 15 would try to catch both the Super Heavy booster and the ship, and put the odds of a successful ship catch at “more likely than not.” SpaceX also aired an animation of the maneuver during that webcast, showing the ship swinging vertical over Starbase before dropping into the tower’s chopsticks.
The hardware is ready. Booster 22 fired all 33 of its Raptor engines for a full duration static fire at Pad 2 on October 25. Ship 42 followed with a single engine burn simulating a deorbit maneuver on October 26 and a 60 second firing of all six engines the next day, according to NASASpaceflight. Ship 42 had already rehearsed the catch in September, when the Pad 2 arms lifted it into position and crews connected the quick disconnect arm while the vehicle hung from the tower.
The remaining hurdle is regulatory. The FAA’s Starship page does not yet list a Flight 15 license. SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell said in October that, after “significant constructive engagement with the FAA,” she expects the license to cover a return to the launch site and a tower catch for both stages. Bringing the ship home means a reentry path that heads toward land, rather than ending over open ocean as every Starship flight so far has.
SpaceX has caught Super Heavy three times, on Flights 5, 7 and 8, but the ship comes back from orbital velocity and has never been caught. Flight 14 on September 28 was the first Starship to reach orbit, deploying 26 Starlink V3 satellites before splashing down despite an early engine shutdown that Musk blamed on engine computer software.
Musk has called a successful ship catch “the first time that there’s been full recovery of an orbital class rocket,” and he has already named the step after it: a Flight 16 where both the booster and the ship fly again. NASASpaceflight reports that Ship 43, the next vehicle in line, is set for static fire testing in December.
EVgo has tapped Tesla Superchargers for its most recent efforts to expand its charging presence in the United States, a move that seems logical based on the effectiveness of the automaker’s own infrastructure.
EVgo opened its first Supercharger site in Illinois, a 12-stall station near downtown Chicago at 3145 South Ashland Avenue in the Riverside Square & River’s Edge center, right beside a grocery store. This marks the start of the company’s plan to deploy hundreds of Supercharger stalls across the United States, primarily at grocery-anchored Regency Centers properties where drivers can shop, eat, or run errands while they charge.
We’ve opened our first EVgo Supercharger location in Illinois, marking the start of our plan to add hundreds of Supercharger stalls across the U.S.
Designed for both NACS and CCS vehicles with Magic Dock technology, these new sites help make fast charging more accessible and convenient for all EV drivers. Learn more: https://t.co/V92t5FDryQ
— EVgo Fast Charging Network (@evgonetwork) November 5, 2026
The new location uses Tesla’s Magic Dock technology so both NACS and CCS vehicles can plug in natively without drivers needing to carry their own adapters. Peak power reaches 325 kW at this site, with pricing set between $0.25 and $0.35 per kWh depending on the hour—the same rate for Tesla and non-Tesla drivers.
The stalls also appear in Tesla’s in-car navigation and Trip Planner, making them easy for Tesla owners to find and route to. Illinois has seen EV registrations rise nearly 60 percent over the past two years, and EVgo’s broader network has experienced more than 700 percent growth in charging demand over three years, so the timing fits the market’s trajectory.
Choosing Tesla hardware through the Supercharger for Business program turns out to have been a smart, practical move.
Tesla’s V4 stalls and cabinets deliver high, reliable power with a proven track record of strong uptime, while Magic Dock delivers true dual-standard compatibility in one package. Because the sites show up in Tesla’s navigation tools, EVgo instantly gains visibility among millions of existing Tesla drivers, which should raise utilization and help the company double its addressable market as more vehicles adopt NACS. EVgo still owns the stations and sets pricing, yet benefits from Tesla’s established hardware, longer cables, and operational support.
The result is faster, lower-risk infrastructure expansion that serves every EV driver—Tesla or otherwise—with convenient, high-power charging at everyday retail locations. For drivers, that means fewer adapters, more predictable stops, and a denser network just as electric vehicles become everyday transportation.
Tesla is ending Cybertruck production
SpaceX’s next Starship flight set to make history on Friday the 13th
