No he doesn't. He just needs to say that's what he wants and it will be.
He controls both companies, dictates to the board, and can influence government and regulators as he sees fit.
That's extreme capitalism folks.
I said ten years ago that Musk should be nowhere near our space program.
SpaceX should be nationalized if a competent US government returns.
If no competent government returns, the world is in deep trouble.
Musk is a lunatic.
"Elon Musk must persuade Tesla shareholders that a merger with SpaceX is in their interests" should say "Elon Musk must lie to Tesla ...". Musk only does what's in his best interests. Nobody, and I mean nobody, else matters.
No persuading needed, Tesla doesn't have shareholders, it has musk fan boys who will do what ever musk says.
They also know they need to merge so that the government subsidies and contracts that space x lives on will sustain and hide the falling sales of the Swasticars.