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Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.

Elon Musk has shut down the division that runs Tesla’s Supercharger business, dismissed two senior executives and fired hundreds more staff as the electric-car maker continues its restructuring amid a sharp downturn in the EV market.

Musk announced internally on Monday that the head of the superchargers group, Rebecca Tinucci, and Daniel Ho, head of new products, would be leaving along with their entire teams. About 500 people were in the supercharger group, the memo said.

Tesla’s supercharger system is among the largest charging networks in the world, and was one the reasons the company enjoyed such a commanding lead over rival carmakers for so long. While the supercharger operations will continue, the move raises questions over the future of the charging business.

The entire public policy unit will also be disbanded following the departure of its leader, Rohan Patel, in the middle of April.

“Hopefully these actions are making it clear that we need to be absolutely hard core about headcount and cost reduction,’ Musk wrote in the memo, which was first reported by The Information. “While some execstaff are taking this seriously, most are not yet doing so.”

Any manager “who retains more than three people who don’t obviously pass the excellent, necessary and trustworthy test” should resign, he added.

Tesla did not respond to a request for comment.

The latest dismissals at the company come after Musk announced last month that the carmaker would cut “more than 10 per cent” of its total workforce, more than 14,000 jobs, in order to be “lean, innovative and hungry”.

The urgency of the shift was underlined by Tesla reporting a decline of almost 10 per cent in revenues in the first quarter of this year, its first year-on-year quarterly drop since the start of 2020. The share price has more than halved from its November 2021 peak of just under $410 a share.

The decision took staff by surprise. Will Jameson, who worked in the Tesla supercharger team, wrote on X that Musk “has let our entire charging org go”. Another employee of that division, George Bahadue, posted on LinkedIn confirming he had been let go.

He added: “What this means for the charging network, [North American Charging Standard] NACS, and all the exciting work we were doing across the industry, I don’t yet know. What a wild ride it has been.”

When Jameson was asked by a reader on X why the entire division had been let go, he replied “your guess is as good as mine”.

Musk said in the memo that superchargers sites currently under construction would be finished and “some” new locations would be constructed.

The surprise move comes despite Tesla having built the dominant EV charging network with 50,000 sites globally and 15,000 in North America. Recently it has signed contracts with several key rivals including Ford, General Motors and Rivian to use its NACS charging standard.

Models from other carmakers will be able to use its branded charging stations, potentially bringing Tesla significant revenue stream, as well as establishing it as the de facto industry standard.

Tinucci, Ho and Patel are not the only long-standing Musk lieutenants to leave this year. Drew Baglino, senior vice-president leading Tesla’s engineering and technology development for batteries, motors and energy products, resigned in April and Martin Viecha, its head of investor relations, said he would step down on the company’s first-quarter earnings call last week.

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Today’s top stories

Student protesters at Columbia University have begun occupying at least one building this morning after the school gave them a deadline yesterday to leave their encampment by 2:00 p.m. or face suspension. The students say they won’t leave until the school divests from investments in companies operating in Israel.

Demonstrators supporting Palestinians in Gaza barricade themselves inside Hamilton Hall, where the office of the dean is located, on April 30 in New York City.

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Demonstrators supporting Palestinians in Gaza barricade themselves inside Hamilton Hall, where the office of the dean is located, on April 30 in New York City.

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• NPR’s Brian Mann says “things changed fast” after he reported on Up First yesterday that both sides were working on de-escalation. One of the major groups that organized this protest said in a statement that their main encampment is peaceful and separate from the group of students occupying Hamilton Hall, but said the students’ actions were “justified.” As school graduations loom, Mann says universities nationwide are “really struggling” to end these protests without resorting to police force.

Charlotte, N.C., is mourning one of the deadliest days for law enforcement in the city’s history. Three U.S. Marshals and a local police officer were shot and killed yesterday while serving a warrant for weapons charges. Another Marshall and three police officers were wounded. The suspect was also killed. (via WFAE)

• In the last three decades, there have been two incidents where multiple officers were killed in North Carolina, Kenneth Lee with NPR network station WFAE in Charlotte reports. The city’s police chief choked up as he described Joshua Eyer, one of the slain officers who was recently awarded Officer of the Month. An investigation is ongoing as police try to put together what happened and why.

A federal appeals court has ruled that state health insurance plans in West Virginia and North Carolina must cover gender-affirming care. In oral arguments, judges asked about procedures like mastectomies, which are covered for women enrolled in these state plans but not covered for transgender patients. Judge Roger Gregory, writing the majority opinion, called the denial of coverage “obviously discriminatory.”

Today’s listen

The Beijing International Automotive Exhibition, or Auto China 2024, in Beijing, China.

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The Beijing International Automotive Exhibition, or Auto China 2024, in Beijing, China.

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NPR’s Steve Inskeep recently attended this year’s Beijing auto show, which he called “like the Super Bowl, except for cars.” The latest electric vehicles were displayed there, spotlighting the newest front of competition between the U.S. and China. Steve spoke with Tu Le, who writes a newsletter called Sino Auto Insights.

Listen to why American carmakers will need to improve their game to compete with the global electric vehicle market.

Life advice

Photo illustration by Becky Harlan/Getty Images/NPR

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Photo illustration by Becky Harlan/Getty Images/NPR

In the U.S., many weddings occur between May and October, when the warmer, sunnier weather is ideal for outdoor ceremonies. My husband and I attended eight weddings during these months last year. We got married three months ago and have four more weddings to attend this year. If you find yourself in our shoes, this Dear Life Kit episode will help you navigate wedding etiquette as a guest, couple or parent.

• Guests don’t have to spend what the couple spent on them. The average person spends $120 on a gift.
• Your plus-one shouldn’t be expected to chip in for the gift. 
• Couples should avoid telling guests how much they spent. It could make guests feel guilty.
• The rule that the bride’s family should pay for the wedding is outdated. Sit down with both families to decide who should be in charge of what.

3 things to know before you go

Valentine’s Mascara by street artist Banksy, on the side of a house in Margate, England.

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Valentine’s Mascara by street artist Banksy, on the side of a house in Margate, England.

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1. What happens when Banksy graces your property with one of his works? While some property owners try to turn a profit from the street artist’s murals, others have carried the intense and costly responsibility of protecting them.
2. The World Health Organization says its latest global measles numbers are “very concerning.” The first several months of 2024 have seen nearly 100,000 measles cases. 
3. Scientists have discovered a way to restore brain cells impaired by a life-threatening genetic disorder called Timothy syndrome. The approach may help researchers develop treatments for other genetic conditions, including the ones that cause schizophrenia, epilepsy and ADHD. 

This newsletter was edited by Majd Al-Waheidi.

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free

Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.

There are three things that Joe Biden cannot shake off: his Secret Service guards, his own shadow and the phrase “ . . . since Lyndon Johnson”. He is described as the most consequential Democratic president since Lyndon Johnson. He is said to have brought about the largest expansion of the federal government since Lyndon Johnson. The historical comparison is meant well. In fact, it undersells him.

In turning ideas into statute, LBJ had lavish advantages. Democrats outnumbered Republicans around two-to-one in both houses of Congress for much of the 1960s. Having replaced the slain John F Kennedy, he began with the nation’s goodwill, and could present his reforms as his predecessor’s unfinished work. Biden had neither the numbers nor the moral head-start. Still, last week, the Ukraine aid package joined the American Rescue Plan, the Inflation Reduction Act and a vast infrastructure splurge in Biden’s canon of important (or at least expensive) laws.

What are we to learn from this prolific doer of things? What, as we near its end, is the lesson of this startlingly fertile presidential term?

One thing above all: eloquence is overrated. So is charisma, vision-setting and all the other “performance” aspects of politics. Biden was an average-to-poor communicator even before his age-related deterioration. He has no signature speech or even epigram to show for half a century in frontline politics. What he does have is more inside experience of Washington — its details, its unwritten codes — than any president ever. The result is a one-term legacy that exceeds what such silver-tongues as Bill Clinton managed in two.

The haggling over Ukraine was instructive. For weeks, Biden applied private pressure on Mike Johnson, the House Speaker, showing him intelligence briefings but never badgering him in front of voters or Republican colleagues. Biden understood, as his more outwardly gifted predecessors didn’t always, the importance of face. Something else, too: he can count.

A leader can’t be so presentationally inept as to be unelectable. But once that low standard is met, there are diminishing returns to star power. Britain’s two greatest postwar leaders were the taciturn Clement Attlee and the plodding communicator Margaret Thatcher. (Much of her charisma has been ascribed to her in retrospect.) Their nation-changing qualities — stamina, focus, certitude — were in the private side of politics, which is most of politics.

Liberals need to hear this more than most. American ones in particular can be crashing snobs about education and speech. In The West Wing, they got to create their ideal president. The result? A hyper-articulate Yankee Brahmin. Similarly, it took decades to correct the overvaluation of Kennedy, with his polish and fluency, as against Johnson. (Camelot. What a tellingly aristocratic metaphor.)

But the ultimate beneficiary of this liberal obsession with rhetoric was Barack Obama. It wasn’t even profound rhetoric. “In no other country on Earth is my story even possible.” What? In no other country can the son of an African immigrant become a provincial lawmaker? (Obama was an Illinois senator when he said it.) This is nice-sounding hokum. But it was enough to blind people to the faults of an administration that is now undergoing a downward revision. Biden is to Obama what Johnson was to Kennedy.

In the distant past, when the state did little outside of war, inspiring people was the core task of leadership. Hence the study of rhetoric in classical education. Once government took a welfare and economic role, the mechanics of lawmaking mattered more. But the perception of what constitutes a leader never caught up. Because people overvalue what they themselves are good at, the educated politico-media class overvalues eloquence.

I say all this as no particular admirer of Biden’s domestic bills. If he loses re-election, the culprit will be inflation, to which his spending has probably contributed. His protectionism almost guarantees immense waste and fragments the world trade order that allowed the postwar US to bind countries to it. What now is its offer to nations gravitating into China’s orbit? And while Johnson’s work lasted — God help the politician who touches Medicare — Biden’s might not. The US debt position won’t allow for endless further subsidies.

Still, there are other moments to discuss how Biden uses his political skill. Just recognise that skill, and how little it relies on words. If a “great” leader is one who changes things, for better or not, this is an administration of mumbling, tongue-tied greatness.

janan.ganesh@ft.com