The OP article is paywalled, so I can't read it, but this one expands more on the issue.

For instance, "four Tesla stores claimed roughly 8,600 sales in one weekend from January 10 through 12, just hours after the feds announced the rebate program would be paused when it ran out of money."

Red flag.

"Speaking as a person who once toiled in the dealership environment, this author will say it is not unheard of for the business office to backdate an occasional deal in order to make some sort of quota or qualify for a volume bonus. One or two machines recorded for yesterday instead of today isn’t generally the end of the world.

But the level of alleged chicanery on display at these Tesla stores seems egregious, particularly since it involves massive amounts of money from the public purse."

Very questionable, indeed.

Why would those stores wait to submit those claims, assuming that's the explanation? They risked not getting the rebates at all, and it makes no sense to hold on to thousands of claims like that, regardless.

Then you get this report:

“Keep in mind that Tesla is struggling when it comes to sales in Canada right now,” Carscoops writes. “According to the National Post, deliveries nosedived some 70 percent between December 2024 and January 2025. When the Canadian government announced that it would soon end electric vehicle subsidies, it was expected that Tesla would see a small bump up in sales. However, a giant spike like this is a different ballgame altogether.”

How many red flags do we need?

I hope the findings of the investigation are made available to the public.