Tesla's Elon Musk Joins Other Companies In Legal Battle Against Donald Trump 'Muslim Ban'

The CEO OF Tesla has joined 97 other companies, which include Apple, Airbnb, Facebook, Google and Intel amongst others to stand against the newly elected president Trump's ideas on immigration, stating mainly that it violates the constitution, but also on many other grounds. The companies have already filled a legal brief adding to the opposition to the policies, one of which states that the majority of America's greatest achievements were made by immigrants.

'Immigrants make many of the Nation’s greatest discoveries and create some of the country’s most innovative and iconic companies,' according to Bloomberg. 'America has long recognized the importance of protecting ourselves against those who would do us harm. But it has done so while maintaining our fundamental commitment to welcoming immigrants—through increased background checks and other controls on people seeking to enter our country.'

The technology sector seem to the most vocal in opposition to the Trump immigration policies, with Google setting up their own crisis fund for those affected by the policy and Microsoft and Facebook publicly voicing their opinions. However, Elon Musk may also be in a tricky position having joined the newly elected president's, strategic and policy forum only last December and Trump’s Manufacturing Jobs Initiative. Musk has also defended his current advisory roles as in the tweet below.

Activists should be pushing for more moderates to advise President, not fewer. How could having only extremists advise him possibly be good?— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 5, 2017

The joint amicus brief signed by all the tech companies recently against the immigration ban were lacking Musks signature, although he has given vocal support to the cause. This is all understandable as Tesla have a huge amount of government subsidiaries as much as $4.5 billion and every Tesla owner in the US having a $7,500 federal tax credit on their vehicle adds to a lot of government help which Tesla cannot afford to lose any time soon. Obviously Musk doesn't want to get on the wrong side of the new administration to rock the boat, especially with grand plans in order for Tesla in the next few years with the model 3 and the Gigafactory. However, some public support for the opposition to immigration shows more of a middle ground.

Only time will tell which way Trump and Musk move in the future, but aligning too much with Trump in the near future could be detrimental to a business maverick like Musk, but losing favor with Trump could also hurt Tesla moving forward. Only time will tell.