I'm a foreigner so I don't fully understand this, but here's my take: 1) Tesla is restarting the factory against local rules saying they can't, because their competition is in different localities with their local rules saying they can, and Tesla is at a disadvantage. 2) It's basically illegal for the workers to go to work, but Tesla is still insisting they do this? 3) the local council has said they won't do enforce…
We could still debate the moral wisdom of resuming production with significant additional safety procedures. Tesla is communicating that they've managed to do this successfully and safely at a similar factory in Shanghai.
There's really three aspects to this:
(1) The wisdom and timing of resuming normal activities with sufficient precautions (and if not now, then when?)
(2) The specific legal problems of doing this after the state has allowed re-opening, but before the county has done so, and one week before it would otherwise be allowed
(3) Musk's seemingly-irrational and spastic way of communicating his intents and opinions on Twitter
The US debate on the quarantine measures is so polarized it's ridiculous. I personally disagree that all nonessential economic activity involving face-to-face contact should be shut down for >12 months until a vaccine might be ready. So it follows that a return to workplaces that can mostly be made safe must happen at some point. Should this happen when it's safe, or at some predetermined point in time? Who decides? How should companies behave if their competitors choose a specific strategy?
I was the first person in my area to call out for social distancing, shutdowns and quarantines, even before any official response was in the cards, so please don't write me off as a right-wing parrot for pointing this out. The US response was atrocious, cost hundreds of billions and tens of thousands of lives already. But now it's the reality we have.
Musk's apparent Twitter insanity is its own story. I think it's mostly relevant for the court of public opinion. He obviously has other motivations for his tweets than seeking the truth, but his plays are quite rational. He has a history of framing reality in ways that aren't compatible with the most objective interpretation. Calling it lying would generally be an overstatement, but some of it has been very dishonest.
In this case, the most likely explanation is a strong wish to not lose the competitive position of Tesla, along with playing an existing political divide to build support with the right-voting population that would previously dismiss him and Tesla as liberal tree-huggers.
This is actually a decent marketing strategy in the social media, Twitter-fuelled post-truth world. But as many other things Musk has done over the years, both in public and out of it, it's a balancing act on the edge of the abyss.