Every weekend in recent months, Mike Ignatowski has gone to one of the two Tesla dealers in Austin, Texas, to protest against Elon Musk, the Chief Executive of Tesla and the most famous transplant to the most left-wing city in the state.
Not long ago, Mr Ignatowski, a 67-year-old computer engineer, was an admirer of Mr. Musk-Voordat Mr. Musk had imposed his coordination with President Trump. Now Mr. Ignatowski a “Fire Elon” sign during the protests, even while admitting that he is not completely crazy enough to give up the Blue Model 3 Tesla that he bought “before we knew that Elon was crazy”, as his bumpersticker confirms.
This is how it goes in the capital of Texas, where the sharp right -wing shift of Mr. Musk was received with a mix of anger and her vibrating pain. The conflicting feelings of Austin reflect both the economic influence of the billionaire entrepreneur on the city and the wider transformation of the city of a medium -sized university city that is arranged around the state of Capitol for a technically driven metropolis with a skyline with glass and samples and a changing image.
Tie-rejuvenated T-shirts still attract residents to “keep Austin weird”, usually in hotels and tourist shops. But a different kind of counterculture has achieved root in the midst of an intake of certainly just figures (including Mr. Musk), self -described Freethinkers (such as the Podcasters Joe Rogan and Lex Fridman) and conservative entrepreneurs (such as Joe Lonsdale). Already in the city, Austin’s resident was a conspiracy theorist, Alex Jones, and his extreme right -wing infowars. There is even a new, contrast to higher education that wants to compete with the University of Texas in Austin, the University of Austin.
Weird, perhaps, but not in the way of the old bumper sticker Mantra.
“If you say ‘Keep Austin weird’ to someone under 40 years old, they would consider it an antique slogan, such as Ye Old Shoppe,” said HW Brands, a historian at the University of Texas. “It has no resonance for their lived experience from Austin.”
The transformation of the city followed a deliberate project for decades to attract technology companies to its rolling hills.
“I am someone who thinks it has changed for the better,” said Gary Farmer, who helped new companies to attract as the founders of Opportunity Texas, an economic development group. “The Culinary Arts, The Performing Arts, The Visual Arts, The Music Scene – it’s all better.”
At the same time, house prices have been raised and the population – all the whitest among large cities in Texas – has shifted part of its diversity.
In 2023, more people from Austin’s Travis County moved than moved, and the share of Spanish residents in Austin fell, even if in all of Texas, the Spanish population has grown to become a number of majority. Black families have also left Austin, said Lila Valencia, the demographer of the city.
The largest increase in new residents was among households who earned more than $ 200,000 a year, which grew by 70 percent from 2019 to 2023, said Mrs. Valencia. The share of households that earned less than $ 100,000 a year fell.
Austin now has around 100 accredited private schools, more than double the 39 that it had two decades ago. The registration in the public schools of the city has fallen.
For years the locals resisted development, without result.
“They built many highways in Houston and Dallas, and Austin turned that money,” said Tyson Tuttle, the former Chief Executive of Silicon Labs, who moved to Austin in 1992. “They said, if we don’t build it, they won’t come. And they came anyway.”
Many in the new elite of Austin have shocked the progressive policy in the city and provincial government about issues such as homelessness and police. Last year some of them supported, including Mr. Musk, a primary challenger for the local democratic district procurer, José Garza. In a company -wide e -mail, Mr. Musk Tesla encouraged employees to vote To support the challenger.
Mr Garza won the primary with a margin of two on one.
“If an asteroid fell out of the blue and a democratic candidate for the office in Travis County would be killed and that person would kill that person would still defeat a living republican,” said Evan Smith, a former leader of the Texas Tribune, a non-profit news site based in Austin.
Nevertheless, the demographic transformation of the city has led many to regret his fading identity as a place of street buses and a Cross-dressing, homeless mayor candidate. The Austin Chronicle, an alternative weekly newspaper, even sells a shirt that reads “Rip Old Austin.”
Earlier this year, passers-by stopped to listen to a spontaneous street performance at Congress Street, such as old times, except that the guitarist was the Trump-friendly Ted NugentAnd his appearance was organized by hard-right Republicans.
Almost as usual are complaints about the complainants.
“I am not one of those no -sayers about Austin who say it was all better in the old days,” said Terry Lickona, who produced for 50 years “Austin City Limits“A public television programs for local and national musicians. He added:” Austin has always attracted big characters “, including Willie Nelson and Michael Dell, the computer maker.
The struggles in Tesla, where The profit has fallen sharply Because Mr. Musk began to set himself up with Mr. Trump, could directly influence the city. At the same time, Austin will be the provincial land for his next large company: self-driving Tesla taxis, who promised Mr. Musk for June.
Mr. Musk did not respond to an interview request.
“Having Tesla here is a huge advantage for the city,” said Mr Tuttle, who recently established an artificial intelligence startup. “I wish Elon would come home and concentrate on his company.”
The arrival of Mr. Musk and Tesla five years ago was an important moment for the city, in which a transformation of years of years was supported by the COVID-19 Pandemie. Many people, including celebrities and dissatisfied Californians whose politics shifted in the midst of the Lockdowns, sought the relative openness of Texas.
“It is most of the good things and very little of the bad things,” Mr. Rogan said during an interview from 2021 with Mr Adler, months after his move.
The result is a slight moderation of the politics and tensions of the city about Mr. Musk between those who hate his actions in Washington and those who love his role as a technology entrepreneur.
The city “attracts people who are on all sides of problems,” says Joshua Baer, the founder of the Capital Factory, who helps to finance and cherish technological startups. “My world is generally Elon fans and supporters.”
On a recent evening, more than two dozen Austinites gathered in a church meeting room decorated with colorful inclusiveness for a meeting of Resist Austin, which organizes protests against Mr. Musk and Mr. Trump at Tesla dealers.
“Our mission is legally non -violent resistance from authoritarians,” said Ian Crowl, an organizer, to the group, including pensioners, technical employees and students graduated. “If you want to throw a rock at a Tesla,” he added, “that’s not what we do here.”
Such tensions have also been in the mind of Tesla drivers in Austin. Vikki Goodwin, a representative of the Democratic State, said she is trying to be ‘invisible’ when driving around in hers. When a car recently rammed in her, she was afraid it might have been intentional.
“Oh my God,” said Mrs. Goodwin she thought, “is it anger that drove him into my car?”
The driver actually used his wife’s car, Mrs. Goodwin said he told her, and he assumed it would soon delay if he pulled his foot off the accelerator pedal-as his Tesla does.
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