The Left cannot tolerate dissent, but it absolutely hates a heretic. Elon Musk has transformed from climate hero to anti-bureaucratic villain, and the Left’s shock troops are wielding Molotov cocktails at the most accessible symbol of his influence: the Tesla.
Of course, in doing so, these vandals don’t harm Elon Musk, the hated godfather of DOGE. Rather, they harm the men and women who purchased the electric cars Musk’s company created. These electric car owners may be more likely to agree with leftist causes, but it seems the vandals aren’t afraid to target their own allies in their mad hatred.
Attorney General Pam Bondi has rightly described these attacks as a form of domestic terrorism, and FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino said the bureau is investigating them. It seems the vandals have a tool to aid them in this grisly spree: a map claiming to plot the location of every Tesla owner across the United States.
A website called “Dogequest” claims to have published the personal information of Tesla owners across the country, and it turns the user’s cursor into a Molotov cocktail. The site’s operators, who also posted the exact locations of Tesla dealerships, say they will only remove personal information if the Tesla owners provide proof that they sold their electric vehicles, 404 Media reported.
As a longtime observer of the Left’s Soviet-style tactics to enforce its ideology on the American people, I can’t help but think of a similar map that aims to instill terror in the Left’s ideological opponents.
The Southern Poverty Law Center, which gained its reputation by suing KKK groups into bankruptcy, publishes a “hate map” that smears mainstream conservative and Christian groups. The map includes Klan chapters, but alongside them it plots parental rights groups like Moms for Liberty, Christian law firms like Alliance Defending Freedom, and immigration groups like the Federation for American Immigration Reform.
The SPLC uses a weasel-y definition of “hate group” to justify demonizing those who dissent from its far-left agenda. As I wrote in my book, “Making Hate Pay: The Corruption of the Southern Poverty Law Center,” the map also doubles as a fundraising tool—as the SPLC adds more organizations to the map, it spreads the message that hate is increasing, and only the SPLC can be trusted to counter it.
A terrorist also used the “hate map” to target a conservative Christian nonprofit in Washington, D.C. in 2012. While the Family Research Council’s building manager prevented the attack from becoming a massacre, the shooter later told the FBI he used the SPLC map to find his target. The SPLC rightly condemned the attack, but has kept the Family Research Council on the “hate map” ever since.
A former SPLC spokesman specifically said, “Our aim in life is to destroy these groups,” to so “mortally embarrass them” that they are ostracized from society.
The SPLC is currently preparing for a public defamation trial regarding an organization it branded an “anti-immigrant hate group.”
The same cynical strategy of silencing opponents by branding them hateful animates the SPLC “hate map” and the similarly terrifying “Dogequest” map.
The SPLC has long carried water for the shock troops of Antifa, keeping the black bloc rioters off its hate map. In fact, an SPLC lawyer got arrested at an Antifa riot in 2023. The SPLC also hired Megan Squire, an activist researcher whom Wired once described as Antifa’s “secret weapon,” a sort of information middlewoman between the center and its allies on the street.
Just as Antifa may use the SPLC map to establish targets, so the Left’s activists might use “Dogequest” to target Tesla owners.
Of course, the SPLC doesn’t turn your cursor into a Molotov cocktail when you visit the “hate map,” but a similar principle applies.
The Left can’t stomach the fact that some people just don’t agree with transgender orthodoxy, with open borders, or with the notion that parents—not bureaucrats—know what’s best for their children. So the SPLC represents a useful tool to demonize dissenters.
Now, leftists can’t stomach the idea that the world’s richest man wants to claw back the size and scope of the federal government, so they’re taking it out on… innocent bystanders who buy cars from his company.
The Left has identified its targets. Americans shouldn’t stand for it.
