- Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, and Donald Trump, the president of the USA, are totally engaged in a mud-slinging battle on-line. Trump stated he was “very disappointed in Elon” for attacking his “big, beautiful bill.” Then Musk stated “without me, Trump would have lost the election.” Trump doubled down, saying the simplest approach to save the federal government cash is “to terminate Elon’s Governmental Subsidies and Contracts.” Lastly, Musk stated “time to drop the really big bomb. [Trump] is in the Epstein files.”
Simply three hours after Musk moved the goal of his web ire on Thursday from Trump’s spending invoice to Trump himself, the 53-year-old Tesla CEO stated, “Time to drop the really big bomb. @realDonaldTrump is in the Epstein files. That is the real reason they have not been made public.”
He ended his publish with, “Have a great day, DJT!”
Musk didn’t present any proof to help his claims.
Tesla inventory is down over 16% as of three:30 p.m. ET Thursday.
Whereas Trump is talked about in Jeffrey Epstein’s flight logs, and the 2 males had been photographed collectively for a few years, Trump has distanced himself from Epstein’s alleged crimes, so it’s unclear what Musk is accusing Trump of, precisely. Fortune has reached out to Musk for extra info. It’s value noting that Musk himself was additionally photographed with Ghislaine Maxwell, who in 2021 was discovered responsible of kid intercourse trafficking, amongst different offenses, in reference to Epstein.
For what it’s value, the Justice Division has stated it’s regularly working to evaluation and launch extra Epstein-related supplies, however many on each side of the aisle are sad with how slowly that’s taking place.
The back-and-forth between two of the world’s strongest males started when Musk took to X, née Twitter, to criticize Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” that notably calls to finish the $7,500 electric-vehicle subsidies that Tesla has benefited from for years. Musk referred to as the “massive, outrageous, pork-filled” spending invoice a “disgusting abomination” on Tuesday.
“This spending bill contains the largest increase in the debt ceiling in US history!” Musk wrote. “It is the Debt Slavery Bill.”
On Wednesday, Home Speaker Mike Johnson stated he had spoken to Trump about Musk’s X posts. “He’s not delighted that Elon did a 180 on that,” Johnson instructed reporters.
By Thursday, Trump was requested within the Oval Workplace how he felt about about Musk popping out in opposition to the spending invoice.
“I would have won Pennsylvania regardless of Elon,” Trump instructed reporters Thursday. “I’m very disappointed with Elon. He knew this bill better than anyone and he only developed a problem when he found out I would cut the EV mandate.”
In response, Musk dug into Trump on X. “Without me, Trump would have lost the election, Dems would control the House and the Republicans would be 51-49 in the Senate,” he wrote.
Trump, on Thursday afternoon, took to Fact Social to reply to Musk’s jabs.
“Elon was ‘wearing thin,’ I asked him to leave, I took away his EV Mandate that forced everyone to buy Electric Cars that nobody else wanted (that he knew for months I was going to do!), and he just went CRAZY!” Trump wrote on Fact Social.
“The easiest way to save money in our Budget, Billions and Billions of Dollars, is to terminate Elon’s Governmental Subsidies and Contracts,” he added. “I was always surprised that Biden didn’t do it!”
Trump and Musk have a posh historical past that dates again to Trump’s first presidency. Musk joined two of Trump’s advisory councils after successful the 2016 election, however stepped down from each councils after the president pulled the U.S. out of the Paris local weather settlement, saying on Twitter on the time, “Climate change is real. Leaving Paris is not good for America or the world.”
Issues acquired notably bitter between the 2 males in 2022, when Trump went in on Musk in a brutal Fact Social publish, saying, “when Elon Musk got here to the White Home asking me for assistance on all of his many sponsored initiatives, whether or not it’s electrical automobiles that don’t drive lengthy sufficient, driverless automobiles that crash, or rocket ships to nowhere, with out which subsidies he’d be nugatory, and telling me how he was an enormous Trump fan and Republican, I may have stated, ‘drop to your knees and beg,’ and he would have achieved it.”
This story was initially featured on Fortune.com
