Musk slams ‘pup­pet­mas­ters’ after pro­test­ers strug­gle to explain why they call Trump a ‘fas­cist’ in viral video

Elon Musk slammed the alleged “pup­pet­mas­ters” behind anti-Trump demon­stra­tions this week­end after viral video showed pro­test­ers strug­gling to explain why they believe Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump is a “fas­cist.” 

“The prob­lem is the pup­pet­mas­ters, not the pup­pets, as the lat­ter have no idea why they are even there,” Musk post­ed to X on Sun­day accom­pa­nied by video footage of pro­test­ers stum­bling over what issues they have with Trump. 

“He just does every­thing he wants… He’s a con­vict­ed felon, you know, that’s all I know,” one pro­test­er in the video said after trip­ping over why he believes Trump is a “fas­cist,” while hold­ing a sign read­ing, “The Fas­cist Trump Regime Must Go.” The footage was record­ed by Ted Good­man, a polit­i­cal strate­gist who launched a livestream pro­gram with for­mer New York City May­or Rudy Giu­liani, on Sat­ur­day in Wash­ing­ton, D.C.

“One of the things is he’s try­ing to con­trol the media,” anoth­er pro­test­er in the video respond­ed when asked for evi­dence Trump is alleged­ly a “fas­cist.”

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“Does­n’t every pres­i­dent try to con­trol the nar­ra­tive?” Good­man pressed. 

“They try to con­trol their own nar­ra­tive. But one of the things that Trump has done, for exam­ple, is the renam­ing the Gulf of Mex­i­co and then not allow­ing the Asso­ci­at­ed Press to come into the White House,” the pro­test­er con­tin­ued. 

The first pro­test­er explained in the video that he was there after he “saw peo­ple were hang­ing out,” while the sec­ond pro­test­er explained he was there due to “exec­u­tive over­reach.” 

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The first pro­test­er added that he had been giv­en a sign describ­ing Trump as a “fas­cist,” as well as a print­ed one-sheeter that declared, “We are fac­ing fas­cism… The time to act is now!” along­side a pho­to­shopped image of Trump with a Hitler-styled mus­tache. 

Video of the pro­test­ers racked up more than 12 mil­lion views on X by Sun­day after­noon. 

More than 1,200 protests were held across the nation on Sat­ur­day as crit­ics gath­ered to protest the admin­is­tra­tion, the Depart­ment of Gov­ern­ment Effi­cien­cy (DOGE), rec­i­p­ro­cal tar­iffs, fed­er­al lay­offs and immi­gra­tion reform. 

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“[I’m] protest­ing how hor­ri­ble things have become in our coun­try,” one pro­test­er told Fox News Dig­i­tal from a demon­stra­tion in New York on Sat­ur­day. “I mean, we’ve been tak­en over by a bunch of rob­ber barons who are try­ing to take away all of our rights, ben­e­fits and lib­er­ty.”

“I am protest­ing what is hap­pen­ing with this blessed coun­try, the democ­ra­cy that was advanced democ­ra­cy now in tran­si­tion to a dic­ta­tor­ship, and we are almost in a fas­cist state right now – only because the rule of law is bend­ing right now, and it may break,” anoth­er pro­test­er told Fox Dig­i­tal. 

The protests this week­end fol­low mass protests tar­get­ing Tes­la last week­end. Elon Musk, who is help­ing lead DOGE and is a staunch Trump ally, is the CEO of Tes­la and has seen anti-Trump crit­ics phys­i­cal­ly attack, mon­e­tar­i­ly boy­cott, and protest the car com­pa­ny over his pol­i­tics. 

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“Who is fund­ing and orga­niz­ing all these paid protests?” Musk post­ed to X last week­end of the recent anti-Tes­la protests. 

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Amid the protests, a local news out­let, media per­son­al­i­ties and con­ser­v­a­tive crit­ics spec­u­lat­ed that the anti-Tes­la protests were embroiled in “astro­turf­ing,” which is defined by Mer­ri­am-Web­ster as a cam­paign “false­ly made to appear grass­roots.” 

Fox News Dig­i­tals’ Kaylee Hol­land and Made­line Cog­gins con­tributed to this report.