Tesla reduces staffing but ‘very well could still be making cars’

According to an Alameda County spokesperson, Tesla is reducing staffing levels at its manufacturing plant in Fremont, Calif., but perhaps not to the levels necessary to comply with the San Francisco Bay area’s regional lockdown order. 

“They told us they had gone from about 10,000 individual employees to about 2,500,” he said. “It sounds to me like they very well could still be making cars. We are continuing to stress to them that they must move to minimum basic operations, if they are still making cars.”

Shortly after the “shelter in place” edict was issued, Tesla CEO Elon Musk sent an email to employees saying the plant would continue to operate but that workers who are concerned should feel free to stay home. The county sheriff’s office on Tuesday afternoon said Tesla is not considered an essential business under that order and cannot continue to operate its factory normally.

Still, witnesses reported that there were still thousands of cars in the factory parking lot. Workers were seen entering and exiting the factory, there were food trucks onsite and a landscaping contractor rode a lawnmower around the grounds. The photo gallery above shows all the work going on at the plant on March 18, 2020.

The county spokesman said on Wednesday county officials needed to move on to other issues regarding the virus rather than focus on Tesla.

“Tesla needs to comply with the health order,” he said, adding that the county did not want to force people into compliance, but implement changes with their consent.

A spokeswoman for the Fremont Police Department on Wednesday said attorneys for Alameda County and the city were discussing how to interpret the lockdown order by San Francisco Bay Area officials.

“This is all very new and there are a lot of moving parts,” the spokeswoman said, adding that the conversations concern all manufacturers in the region.

The attorneys are not discussing enforcement or disobedience measures, but were trying to understand how state and federal exemptions factored in, she said.

Reuters contributed to this report.

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