President Donald Trump has threatened to “terminate” Elon Musk’s federal contracts and cancel subsidies beneficial to his companies after the billionaire publicly accused the president of being ungrateful in an explosion of tensions between the two men who lavished praise on one another less than a week ago as Trump bid Musk farewell from the administration. .
“The easiest way to save money in our Budget, Billions and Billions of Dollars, is to terminate Elon’s Governmental Subsidies and Contracts. I was always surprised that Biden didn’t do it,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
Beyond Trump’s own public threat of retribution on Thursday afternoon, the desire within the administration to exact, or at least dangle, swift vengeance on Musk is indeed spiking. This is in part because in recent months, some of Trump’s most senior officials — Marco Rubio, Sean Duffy, Peter Navarro, you name it — have actively stewed over Musk’s intrusion into their work portfolios, finding him to be massively annoying.
This week, two Trump administration officials tell Rolling Stone that the government may not be above revamping investigations into Musk’s business empires — probes that carried over from the Biden era and ones that Musk was extremely adamant he wanted to see a second Trump administration crush, if the Tesla billionaire helped elect Trump.
“THIS ADMINISTRATION COULD ALWAYS START THE INVESTIGATIONS AGAIN,” one senior Trump appointee messaged in all-caps.
Trump slammed Musk from the Oval Office on Thursday when asked about the billionaire’s opposition to his reconciliation bill — which is currently working its way through the Senate. Musk responded by taking direct aim at the president, writing that “without me, Trump would have lost the election, Dems would control the House and the Republicans would be 51-49 in the Senate.”
“Such ingratitude,” Musk added in another post.
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Shortly after, Trump took to Truth Social to draw a line in the digital sand, threatening Musk’s contracts.
In another post, the president added that “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!”
Musk’s meltdown continued with one of the least surprising truth bombs in recent memory.
“Time to drop the really big bomb,” Musk wrote, “@realDonaldTrump is in the Epstein files. That is the real reason they have not been made public. Have a nice day, DJT!”
Trump’s friendly relationship with accused sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, who died in custody in 2019, has been well documented for decades. In 2019 it was reported that the president’s name appeared in a “blackbook” of Epstein’s clients. “Mark this post for the future. The truth will come out,” Musk added in a follow up post.
In the replies, another user asked Musk: “why’d you work for the guy if you knew this?”
Musk’s various companies have benefited substantially from his relationship with the federal government. According to a February report from The Washington Post, Musk’s companies have received over $38 billion in government contracts, loans, subsidies, and tax credits over the course of over two decades. In the months he spent as the de-facto head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), Musk meddled with contracts granted to his potential competitors, saw his own products receive favorable treatment, and meddled with regulators who oversee and investigate his businesses.
Musk’s involvement with the federal government, including his reckless leadership of DOGE, caused consternation at his flagship companies, and Tesla’s stock once again took a nose dive on Thursday amid his feud with the president. Musk may soon find himself learning the least-guarded secret in Washington the hard way: When it comes to Trump, it’s better to be in his good graces than out of them.
From Rolling Stone US
