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Tesla factory workers intensify unionization efforts, file charges with National Labor Board
Tesla has dismissed charges filed by the Unfair Labor Practice with the National Labor Relations Board by two employees as “entirely without merit,” stating that it will respond to the allegations as part of the NLRB process.
In the latest chapter of the fight to unionize the Tesla Fremont factory, the United Autoworkers Union is again attempting to sway employees to the cause by filing an unfair labor practice charge, alleging illegal surveillance, coercion, intimidation and prevention of worker communications by Tesla in an effort to prevent or otherwise hinder unionization of the Fremont factory.
In response to past attempts by the UAW to influence workers at the Fremont factory to form a union, Tesla CEO Elon Musk made his pitch to employees against unionization in a letter to employees where he extolled the benefits Tesla was already providing without a union. The basis behind his argument hinged largely on the valuation of Tesla stock issued to employees and the subsequent increase in price of that stock.
Tesla was called to task in the charges for what is being characterized as an overly broad confidentiality agreement. Tesla has always operated more like a Silicon Valley technology company than a car manufacturer, and its company policy on confidentiality reflects that of technology companies that produce highly competitive, industry shifting tech that are often bound by strict deadlines.
In the midst of leading the disruption of several industries, while making headlines for every move the company makes, it comes as no surprise that Tesla opted for an overly broad confidentiality agreement. However, the confidentiality agreement was deemed to be so broad that the company was contacted by five members of the California legislature and a number of organizations in the Bay Area in a request to loosen up wording of the agreement and ensure it did not infringe upon employee rights. According to a report by Capital and Main, the statement currently includes language requiring confidentiality in relation to “everything that you work on, learn about or observe in your work about Tesla.”
The new charges also call out Tesla for alleged violations in several specific areas, one of which was preventing the distribution of flyers by employees at shift change on company property. After several workers handed out literature about unionization at the factory in February, Tesla fired back with a new policy stating that workers “were not allowed to pass out any literature unless it was pre-approved by the Employer.” The charges make a plea that employees should have the right to bring up issues and to talk about them amongst themselves as a means of driving towards resolution.
The charges will be reviewed by the NLRB which will make a determination after gathering input from all parties involved.
These charges highlight the challenge Tesla faces as it seeks to ramp up factory operations as part of the Model 3 production ramp. With all hands on deck to deliver Model 3, Tesla has its work cut out for it as it seeks to balance the rights, needs and morale of its employees with the needs of the business.
Here’s the full text of Musk’s company wide email that was published by TechCrunch in February that discusses unionization efforts taking place at the factory. We’ve also obtained a copy of Tesla’s confidentiality agreement to employees which we’ve embedded below.
For Tesla to become and remain one of the great companies of the 21st century, we must have an environment that is as safe, fair and fun as possible. It is incredibly important to me that you look forward to coming to work every day. For that, we must be a fair and just company – the only kind worth creating.
This is vital to succeed in our mission to accelerate the advent of a clean, sustainable energy future. The forces arrayed against us are many and incredibly powerful. This is David vs Goliath if David were six inches tall! Only by being smarter, faster and working well as a tightly integrated team do we have any chance of success. We should never forget the history of car startups originating in the United States: dozens have gone bankrupt and only two, Tesla and Ford, have not. Despite the odds being strongly against us, my faith in you is why I am confident that we will succeed.
That is why I was so distraught when I read the recent blog post promoting the UAW, which does not share our mission and whose true allegiance is to the giant car companies, where the money they take from employees in dues is vastly more than they could ever make from Tesla.
The tactics they have resorted to are disingenuous or outright false. I will address their underhanded attacks below. While this discussion focuses on Fremont, these same principles apply to every Tesla facility worldwide.
Safety First
The workplace issue that comes before any other is safety. If you do not have your health, then nothing else matters. Simply due to size and bad luck, there will always be some injuries in a company with over 30,000 employees, but our goal is simple: to have as close to zero injuries as possible and be the safest factory in the auto industry by far. The Tesla executive team and I are absolutely committed to this goal.
That is why I was particularly troubled by the safety claim in last week’s blog post, which said: “A few months ago, six out of eight people in my work team were out on medical leave at the same time due to various work-related injuries. I hear the ergonomics are even more severe in other areas of the factory.”
Obviously, this cannot be true: if three quarters of his team suddenly went on medical leave, we would not be able to operate that part of the factory. Furthermore, if things were really even worse in other departments, that would mean something like 80% or more of the factory would be out on injury, production would drop to virtually nothing and the parking lot would be almost empty. As you know firsthand, we have the *opposite* problem – there is never enough room to park! In fact, we are working at top speed to build more parking. Also, hopefully our darn BART train station will open before all hell freezes over!
After looking into this claim, not only was it untrue for this individual’s team, it was untrue for any of the hundreds of teams in the factory.
That said, reducing excess overtime and improving safety are extremely important. This is why we hired thousands of additional team members to create a third shift, which has reduced the burden on everyone. Moreover, since the beginning of Tesla production at Fremont five years ago, there have been dedicated health and safety experts covering the factory and we hold regular safety meetings with operations leaders. Since the majority of the injuries in the factory are ergonomic in nature, we have an ergonomics department focused exclusively on this issue.
The net result is that since January 1st, our total recordable incident rate (TRIR) is under 3.3, which is less than half the industry average of 6.7.
Of course, the goal is to have as close to zero injuries as humanly possible, so we need to keep improving. If you have a safety concern or an idea on how to make things better, please let your manager, safety representative or HR partner know. You can also send an anonymous note through the Integrity Hotline (this applies broadly to any problems you notice at our company) or you can email safety@tesla.com.
Compensation
At Tesla, we believe it is important for everyone to be an owner of the company. This is your company. That is why, unlike other car companies, everyone is awarded shares and you get to buy stock at a discount compared to the public through the employee stock purchase program. Last year, stock equity grants were increased significantly and it will happen again later this year once Model 3 achieves high volume.
The chart below contrasts the total comp received by a Tesla production team member who started on January 1, 2013 against the total comp received over the same period at GM, Ford, and Fiat Chrysler. A four year period is used because that’s the vesting length of a new hire equity grant. I believe the equity gain over the next four years will be similar. As shown below, a Tesla team member earned between $70,000 and $100,000 more in total compensation than the employees at other US auto companies!
Work Hours
Another issue raised in the UAW blog was hours worked. First, I want to recognize how hard you worked to make our company successful. Those hours mattered to you, to your family and to our company, and I can’t tell you how much I appreciate them.
However, the pace needs to be sustainable. This is why the third shift was established and why we created alternate work schedules based on feedback from various teams in the factory.
These changes have had a big impact. The average amount of hours worked by production team members this year is about 43 hours per week. The percentage of overtime hours has declined by almost 50% since the super tough time we had last year achieving rate on the Model X, which is probably the hardest car to build in history. What an amazing accomplishment! It is also a lesson learned, which is why Model 3 is designed to be dramatically easier to manufacture.
Fun
As we get closer to being a profitable company, we will be able to afford more and more fun things. For example, as I mentioned at the last company talk, we are going to hold a really amazing party once Model 3 reaches volume production later this year. There will also be little things that come along like free frozen yogurt stands scattered around the factory and my personal favorite: a Tesla electric pod car roller coaster (with an optional loop the loop route, of course!) that will allow fast and fun travel throughout our Fremont campus, dipping in and out of the factory and connecting all the parking lots. It’s going to get crazy good ?
Thanks again for all your effort and I look forward to working alongside you to create an amazing future!
Elon
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Tesla has its answer to grow its automotive sales over the next few years, TD Cowen analyst Itay Michaeli says, but it just has to bring it to the U.S.
On Thursday, Michaeli reiterated his $490 price target and the ‘Buy’ rating he already held on Tesla stock (NASDAQ: TSLA). However, its automotive division has struggled to show sequential growth over the past few years, mostly due to its focus on AI and Full Self-Driving. Tesla already axed two of its lower-volume vehicles with the Model S and Model X earlier this year.
However, Tesla does not need to engineer an entire new vehicle to trigger an upward tick in sales; it just has to bring it from China to the U.S., Michaeli said.
He is talking about the Model Y L, a slightly larger version of the all-electric crossover that is already available in China. U.S. customers have been pleading with CEO Elon Musk to bring it to the country since its launch in Asia last year, but he’s not convinced of it because of the advent of self-driving and its importance in this particular market.
The problem is that Tesla owners have been requesting something larger that could fit a typical American family. The Model Y L is slightly larger than the standard Model Y, but some are concerned that it could still be too small to fit what most people might need.
Instead, they have asked for a full-size SUV from Tesla.
Tesla gives big hint that it will build Cyber SUV, smaller Cybertruck
Nevertheless, the Model Y L still presents a great opportunity for Tesla in the U.S., and Michaeli says that there is an additional sales opportunity of about 100,000 units, with demand potential falling somewhere between 60,000 and 135,000 units.
TD Cowen’s note to investors also analyzed that Tesla’s growth could come from a stock perspective as well, positively impacting the stock price, as it has been widely reliant on vehicle sales, even though Tesla has truly phased itself away from that being an important metric.
Tesla stands to gain greatly from the introduction of the Model Y L in the U.S., but only if Elon Musk sees it as a viable fit for the market. Families may need to see Tesla bring something larger to the U.S., or they might be forced to buy from another automaker that offers something that fits is needs for more interior space to haul around the kids.
Tesla Hardware 3 owners are set to get a new Full Self-Driving version this month as the company plans to release what it is referring to as v14 Lite.
The rollout is not yet confirmed for June, but Tesla executives have stated on several occasions that this more refined FSD iteration will work with their cars and increase its capabilities.
This comes after Tesla admitted during its last Earnings Call that these Hardware 3 vehicles would not be able to achieve Full Self-Driving, something that they did not know when they bought these cars. We regularly receive messages from Hardware 3 owners asking when v14 Lite will come out, what they should expect, and whether it is worth it to upgrade the self-driving computer or buy a new car altogether.
Following future rollout of FSD V14 Lite for HW3 vehicles in the US, we plan on expanding V14 Lite to additional international markets.
This update ensures that HW3 vehicle owners will continue to benefit from ongoing software updates.
Since international rollout is subject to…
— Tesla (@Tesla) April 29, 2026
It is hard not to feel for them; Tesla CEO Elon Musk said at the company’s 2019 Autonomy Day that all vehicles produced at the time, including Hardware 3 cars, had “all the hardware necessary, compute and otherwise, for Full Self-Driving.”
Musk also said in March of that year that, “Anyone who purchased Full Self-Driving will get FSD computer upgrade for free.”
Anyone who purchased full self-driving will get FSD computer upgrade for free. This is the only change between Autopilot HW2.5 & HW3. Going forward “HW3” will just be called FSD Computer, which is accurate. No change to vehicle sensors or wire harness needed. This is v important. https://t.co/lICMpT7xnX
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 29, 2019
However, during the Q1 2026 Earnings Call, Musk admitted that Hardware 3 vehicles would not be capable of FSD, as “It has only 1/8th the memory bandwidth of Hardware 4, and memory bandwidth is one of the key elements needed for unsupervised FSD.”
Tesla has made some effort to remedy these Hardware 3 owners by offering:
- Discounted trade-ins toward AI4 cars
- Hardware retrofits, which would replace the self-driving computer and upgrade all cameras
- Full Self-Driving v14 Lite
The issue is that many of these owners were led to believe their cars would be capable of unsupervised self-driving. Now, they’re left scrambling for options, and while there are several, they will all require more money out of their pockets.
Expectations for Tesla v14 Lite for Hardware 3 Owners
The big differences between the AI4 v14 and v14 Lite for Hardware 3 owners will stem primarily from hardware constraints. Tesla developed v14 Lite with an optimized frame of mind; the v14 neural nets are toned down to run on an HW3 computer.
Tesla v14 will use the same behavior, but its limits will be hardware-related, especially given that the cameras on HW3 vehicles are lower-resolution.
Tesla reveals its plans for Hardware 3 owners who are eager for updates
This will result in potentially more edge cases due to the lower quality perception and less long-range detection, but reaction time and overall confidence should be more refined.
There should also be a handful of additional features that are available on AI4 cars, such as:
- Starting Full Self-Driving from Park
- Auto Shift
- Streaks
- Speed Profiles
- Improved Dynamics, like Pulling Over for Emergency Vehicles
Tesla plans to release v14 Lite this month, but we are all familiar with how the company can be with timelines. Additionally, if v14 Lite has not proven to be ready for a wide release, Tesla will slam the brakes on the rollout.
We would anticipate that Tesla is testing v14 Lite internally, and likely has been for several months.
Elon Musk
SpaceXAI just launched into your kitchen with their new app
SpaceXAI just powered its first consumer app and it predicts what you want to buy.
SpaceXAI just made its first move into consumer AI, and it involves your grocery cart. On June 3, 2026, Gopuff and SpaceXAI announced the launch of Go, a Grok-powered shopping assistant built directly into the Gopuff app that predicts what you need before you even start searching for it.
Gopuff is an instant delivery platform that operates more than 400 micro-fulfillment centers across the U.S., delivering everyday essentials, snacks, drinks, and household items in as little as 15 minutes. It is not a restaurant delivery app or a marketplace. It owns its inventory, controls its warehouses, and handles its own logistics, which means it has built one of the most detailed consumer behavior datasets in retail over its 13-year history.
Go combines SpaceXAI’s advanced reasoning, voice, and image generation models with Gopuff’s dataset of hundreds of millions of orders and real-time cultural signals from X to prepare a suggested cart the moment a customer opens the app. It learns each shopper’s habits and automatically builds a personalized cart based on time of day, location, order history, and real-time indicators. Returning customers can check out with a single tap.
Rather than searching for specific items, users can describe a situation like a game-day party or the desire for a healthy breakfast and Go will assemble a cart automatically. It can also predict when shoppers are running low on items like coffee or paper towels and have them packed and delivered in under 15 minutes. Grok voice integration lets users talk to the app in plain conversational language and check out completely hands-free.
Gopuff co-founder and co-CEO Yakir Gola said: “Today, we believe the greatest friction left in commerce is not delivery or instantaneous access to the essentials customers need. It’s the moment before: the thinking, the deciding, the remembering. We’re combining Gopuff’s demand intelligence with xAI’s frontier reasoning to create an everyday shopping experience that feels like a true extension of you.”
Why SpaceX just made a $60 billion bet on AI coding ahead of historic IPO
The timing carries context beyond the product launch. SpaceXAI was formed after SpaceX completed an all-stock merger with Elon Musk’s xAI earlier this year, folding one of the most advanced AI labs in the world into the same corporate structure as the company preparing what could be the largest IPO in history. SpaceXAI is dipping into consumer-focused AI just as it prepares for its public debut, and while Musk has openly discussed building an everything app, this launch uses Grok to power another company’s product rather than launching a standalone consumer platform. Every consumer-facing deployment of Grok ahead of the IPO roadshow adds tangible evidence that SpaceXAI is not just an infrastructure play but a direct competitor in the AI application layer where OpenAI and Google are already fighting for dominance.
Tesla has its answer to auto growth, it just has to bring it to the U.S.: analyst
Tesla Hardware 3 owners could be made whole this month
