Some executives, including Tesla’s Elon Musk and Palantir’s Alex Karp, have made it abundantly clear why they left.
“This is the final straw,” Musk wrote on X in 2024 after Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a bill into law that barred school staff from informing parents of a student’s gender identity.
The number of companies leaving California is small. According to a 2025 report from the Public Policy Institute of California, only 3% of firms in California moved to a different state. However, larger companies are more likely to leave than smaller ones.
Company relocations are trending upward. Business Insider compiled some of the biggest names so far.