The feud between Elon Musk and Donald Trump seems to have gone from a full boil to a simmer over the weekend, but don’t rule out the possibility of the heat getting turned up again. In a conversation with NBC News, Trump said he has no interest in making nice with Musk right now, but did make it clear that if the billionaire decides to switch parties and back Democratic candidates, “he’ll have to pay consequences for that.”
Trump being Trump, he didn’t explain what those potential retaliatory actions might be, just told NBC they will be “very serious consequences.” Of course, it’s not terribly hard to imagine the levers Trump might pull. He has already threatened to cancel the billions of dollars worth of government contracts that Musk’s companies currently count on, and his close ally and former advisor, Steve Bannon, has encouraged Trump to investigate Musk as an “illegal alien,” deport him, and seize control of his companies under the Defense Production Act. So, he’s got some ideas to work with.
Trump’s threat of action against Musk certainly feels like a line drawn in the sand, but the President has otherwise not really escalated the beef since Musk threw the kitchen sink at him. In a series of now-deleted posts, Musk claimed that Trump appears in the Epstein files and has been withholding information in order to protect himself and supported the idea of impeaching the president whom he spent nearly $300 million trying to get into office. Musk took those posts down, but has continued to be critical of Trump.
Trump rebuked the attacks in his conversation with NBC, calling the Epstein angle “old news” and that he had “nothing to do with” Epstein. “That’s called ‘old news,’ that’s been old news, that has been talked about for years,” he said.
Other than that, Trump has basically just decided to wash his hands of Musk—at least for the time being. When asked if his relationship with the CEO of SpaceX and Tesla is over, Trump told NBC, “I would assume so, yeah.” He also reiterated that he has no intention of speaking with Musk directly and said, “I’m too busy doing other things” and “I have no intention of speaking to him.”
That remains pretty mild for a guy who is certainly capable of being a bomb thrower, but Trump might have a sense that he will come off better by easing off after Musk flew off the handle. A YouGov poll found that among Republicans, 71% would take his side compared to just 6% who said they would throw their backing behind Musk. Even if you expand the survey sample to include Democrats and Independents, Trump comes out ahead with 28% of support compared to just 8% for Musk (though notably, 52% said “Neither,” so the “a pox on both your houses” demographic is strong).
Politico reported Sunday that aides representing both sides have spoken, and there is something of a mutual truce at the moment to stop the bomb-throwing—though it noted that neither Musk nor Trump wanted to stop. Seems like they are locked in a battle of restraint at the moment, which is not exactly a skill either of them is known to possess. We’ll see who breaks the truce first.
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