ACTIVISTS gathered outside Tesla stores across the United States on Saturday to protest against the car maker’s billionaire chief executive Elon Musk and his campaign to cut government jobs.

The rallies were part of more than 50 listed on the Tesla Takedown website on Saturday, with more planned later in March across the US, Britain, Spain and Portugal. 

The protesters hope to discourage and stigmatise purchases of Tesla, the electric car company. 

For weeks activists have organised anti-Tesla protests to galvanise opposition to Mr Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (Doge).

“We can get back at Elon,” said Nathan Phillips, an ecologist from Newton, Massachusetts, who was protesting in Boston on Saturday. 

“We can impose direct economic damage on Tesla by showing up at showrooms everywhere and boycotting Tesla and telling everyone else to get out, sell your stocks, sell your Teslas.”

Mr Musk is slashing thousands of federal jobs, arguing that Mr Trump’s victory was a mandate to restructure the US government. 

White House spokesperson Harrison Fields said: “Protests will not deter President Trump and Elon Musk from delivering on the promise to establish Doge and make our federal government more efficient and more accountable to the hard working American taxpayers across the country.”

Tesla did not respond to a request for comment.