President Donald Trump finally took questions on his stunning public feud with Elon Musk, after laying low for most of Friday – while repeating his threat to probe a litany of Musk contracts.
‘We’ll take look at everything,’ Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One. ‘It’s a lot of money.
He continued: ‘It’s a lot of subsidy … so we’ll take a look… only if it’s fair… only if it’s to be fair for him and the country… ‘
The line on subsidy suggests Trump will continue to push to go after tax credits for electric cars such as the Musk-owned Tesla. That language features in the House-passed ‘big, beautiful bill.
Following the outbreak of their feud, Trump and his allies have said Musk turned on the bill because it cuts the subsidies. Musk has said he doesn’t need them anyway.
At another point Trump disavowed knowledge of calls for probes of Musk – after his longtime ally Steve Bannon, a Musk adversary, said Musk should be probed or even deported.
‘I had no idea there were any… I’ll let them speak for themselves … I have no idea,’ Trump said.
It had been 24 hours since he addressed his extraordinary break with his former ‘first buddy’ who used to accompany him to Mar-a-Lago and who Trump invited to cabinet meeting and hosted the office along with Musk’s child, ‘little X.’
At times Trump appeared to want to tamp down the talk of the feud – despite escalating it with threats and ignoring advice to set up a phone call to settle it.
‘Honestly I’ve been so busy working on China… working on Russia… working on Iran.. I’m not thinking about Elon musk .. I just wish him well,’ Trump said.
And he won’t be demanding Musk return the gold colored key he presented him with in the Oval Office just days ago.
‘No I don’t take things back,’ Trump said.
He dodged a question about dumping his new $80,000 Tesla. ‘I hope he does well with Tesla,’ Trump answered.
Trump held his events – including signing an executive order on drones in the U.S. – behind closed doors. Then, he toured a golf course at Joint Base Andrews in a golf cart while trailed by aides and Secret Service agents.
He ignored shouted questions about his relationship with the world’s richest man while leaving the White House.
It wasn’t until he boarded Air Force One en route to his Bedminister, New Jersey golf club that he finally spoke about the simmering feud that has driven down Tesla’s stock price and prompted speculation about big changes in the space industry as well as talk that Musk’s billions in government contracts could be under threat.
On Thursday Trump and Musk took part in a spectacular public spat, which included cameos by dead serial pedophile Jeffrey Epstein and anti-Semitic rapper Kanye West.
The fallout between Trump and Musk – who were political allies for a little less than a year – started in recent weeks when the billionaire started resisting Republicans’ ‘big, beautiful bill,’ arguing that the spending wiped out DOGE’s cost-cutting efforts.
Then, on Thursday, when Trump was supposed to be hosting the new German Chancellor Friedrich Merz in the Oval Office, he was asked about Musk’s recent criticism.
From there the dam broke.
‘Elon and I had a great relationship. I don’t know if we will any more, I was surprised,’ Trump told reporters.
The president suggested that Musk was angry – not over the bill ballooning the deficit – but because the Trump administration has pulled back on electric vehicle mandates, which negatively impacted Tesla, and replaced the Musk-approved nominee to lead NASA, which could hinder SpaceX‘s government contracts.
‘And you know, Elon’s upset because we took the EV mandate, which was a lot of money for electric vehicles, and they’re having a hard time the electric vehicles and they want us to pay billions of dollars in subsidy,’ Trump said. ‘I know that disburbed him.’
Over the weekend, Trump pulled the nomination of Jared Isaacman to lead NASA. Isaacman had worked alongside Musk at SpaceX.
‘He recommended somebody that I guess he knew very well, I’m sure he respected him, to run NASA and I didn’t think it was appropriate and he happened to be a Democrat, like totally Democrat,’ Trump continued. ‘We won, we get certain privileges and one of the privileges is we don’t have to appoint a Democrat.’
Musk posted to X as Trump’s Q&A with reporters was ongoing.
‘Whatever,’ the billionaire wrote.
‘Keep the EV/solar incentive cuts in the bill, even though no oil & gas subsidies are touched (very unfair!!), but ditch the MOUNTAIN of DISGUSTING PORK in the bill,’ he advised.
‘In the entire history of civilization, there has never been legislation that [is] both big and beautiful. Everyone knows this!’ Musk continued. ‘Either you get a big and ugly bill or a slim and beautiful bill. Slim and beautiful is the way.’
The spat quickly turned personal with Musk then posting that Trump would have lost the 2024 election had it not been for the world’s richest man – him.
Musk had publicly endorsed Trump on the heels of the July 13th assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania and poured around $290 million of his fortune into the Republican’s campaign.
The billionaire also joined Trump on the campaign trail when he returned to the site of the Butler shooting in early October, a month before Election Day. (Daily Mail)
