Taxpayers still took a huge downside risk with the loan to Tesla, and that loan has to be measured against the overall government loan program's losses, which is a massive failure costing billions.
If we're talking about this program in particular, the Energy Department had the following to say: "losses in the $34 billion loan portfolio amount to about 2% of the total."
Even if that 2% is wrong, a loss of even a few billion compared to the entire portfolio of lending is minimal.
Now I'm not going to suggest that all government loans work, as picking winners in the private or pubic sector is very, very hard. But please before regurgitating a statement please back it up with some evidence or reporting on the matter.