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11 minutes ago
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Trump and Musk's feud timeline: From Epstein allegations to Elon's olive branch
On Friday May 30, President Donald Trump handed his close aide and 'first buddy' Elon Musk a golden key to the White House, praising the work the tech billionaire had done for his administration. 'Elon gave an incredible service,' Trump said in a joint press conference with Musk last week. 'There's nobody like him.' That press conference was intended to mark the end of Musk's 130 days as a special government advisor, leading the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) in slashing excess federal spending. For the latest updates on the feud read our blog here Although there had been some disagreements during Musk's time in the role – the Tesla owner made it clear he was not a fan of Trump's tariffs, for instance – the event seemed to mark a conciliatory end to their working relationship. But there were rumblings: Musk, whose whole purpose at DOGE had been reducing federal expense, was deeply opposed to Trump's 'Big Beautiful Bill,' fearing it would ramp up the national debt over the next 10 years. While White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt had successfully managed to spin their difference of opinion as an example of healthy debate for a couple of days, everything came to a head on Thursday June 5. Here's a timeline of how the very public fight between Trump and Musk unfolded, which appeared unresolvable until Musk offered a grovelling apology six days later. Writing on X, Musk says: 'I'm sorry, but I just can't stand it anymore. This massive, outrageous, pork-filled Congressional spending bill is a disgusting abomination. Shame on those who voted for it: you know you did wrong. You know it.' He continued: 'It will massively increase the already gigantic budget deficit to $2.5 trillion (!!!) and burden America (sic) citizens with crushingly unsustainable debt.' Two days later, things escalated dramatically. In an Oval Office appearance with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, Trump said he was 'very disappointed' by Musk's comments. 'Elon knew the inner workings of this bill better than almost anybody sitting here,' Trump told reporters. 'Elon and I had a great relationship. I don't know if we will anymore.' Trump added he 'would have won Pennsylvania easily anyway,' without Musk's help. Musk posts a slew of tweets to X, in one of which he rebuts Trump's point about Pennsylvania, arguing: 'Without me, Trump would have lost the election, Dems would control the House and the Republicans would be 51-49 in the Senate.' In another, he asks, 'Where is this guy today??' in response to a tweet of screenshots from the president's previous criticisms of increasing the debt ceiling. He then tweeted: 'The Big Ugly Bill will INCREASE the deficit to $2.5 trillion!' This is shortly followed by a new suggestion from Musk: 'Is it time to create a new political party in America that actually represents the 80% in the middle?' This post was still pinned to the top of the X owner's timeline for several days thereafter. Responding to MAGA blogger Laura Loomer on X, who was commenting about the divide amongst Republicans over the fight between Musk and Trump, the billionaire said: 'Oh and some food for thought as they ponder this question: Trump has 3.5 years left as President, but I will be around for 40+ years...' The president says that Musk was 'wearing thin' in a series of posts on his social media platform. '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 said. He then added: '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!' Retweeting a screenshot of Trump's EV mandate comment (alluding to the Big, Beautiful Bill scrapping a $7,500 tax credit for EV customers, which would impact Tesla), Musk said: 'Such an obvious lie. So sad.' Musk tweeted: 'Files linked to the investigation of convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein have emerged as a point of fixation for Trump and his allies and right-wing media figures. 'Time to drop the really big bomb: Donald Trump is in the Epstein files. That is the real reason they have not been made public.' Shortly after, he wrote: 'Mark this post for the future. The truth will come out.' 'In light of the President's statement about cancellation of my government contracts, SpaceX will begin decommissioning its Dragon spacecraft immediately,' he tweeted. Another X user replied, urging Musk to 'cool off and take a step back for a couple of days.' Musk replied: 'Good advice. Ok, we won't decommission Dragon.' Trump wrote on Truth Social: 'I don't mind Elon turning against me, but he should have done so months ago. This is one of the Greatest Bills ever presented to Congress. It's a Record Cut in Expenses, $1.6 Trillion Dollars, and the Biggest Tax Cut ever given. 'If this Bill doesn't pass, there will be a 68% Tax Increase, and things far worse than that. I didn't create this mess, I'm just here to FIX IT. This puts our Country on a Path of Greatness. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!' Musk retweets an X user, who said: 'President vs Elon. Who wins? My money's on Elon. Trump should be impeached and JD Vance should replace him.' Musk tweets: 'The Trump tariffs will cause a recession in the second half of this year.' The point echoes a warning issued by many of the president's critics, from economists to pundits, but most notably his former presidential rival Kamala Harris. Musk tweets: 'Call your Senator, Call your Congressman, Bankrupting America is NOT ok! KILL the BILL.' Musk's last repost for the day came from an X user, who said: 'This is why Republicans will likely lose the House in 2026 and then Democrats will spend two years investigating and impeaching President Trump. 'Trump and the Republicans in Congress need to deliver. We want budget cuts. We want agencies shut down. We don't want big govt.' The following day, West Wing aides briefed the media that the two men were planning a private phone call to clear the air, only for the president himself to tell reporters that he had no interest in speaking to the man who had donated at least $288m to his election campaign just months earlier, leaving their once-close relationship in limbo. Trump told Jonathan Karl of ABC News he was 'not particularly' interested in talking to Musk and said to Dana Bash of CNN: 'I'm not even thinking about Elon. He's got a problem. The poor guy's got a problem.' With Trump and his administration subsequently shifting focus to the Los Angeles anti-ICE protests, the tech boss unexpectedly extends an olive branch. 'I regret some of my posts about President Donald Trump last week,' Musk wrote on X in the small hours of the morning. 'They went too far.'
Yahoo
11 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Kweisi Mfume is pitching an old-school approach to one of House Democrats' highest-profile jobs
Frustrated by Democrats' seniority system, Kweisi Mfume fled the House three decades ago, saying he could do more to advance civil rights from the outside. Now he's back and trying to reap the benefits of seniority at a moment when many in his party are starting to openly question it. The Baltimore native last month surprised many House colleagues by entering the wide-open race to lead Democrats on the high-profile Oversight Committee, seeking to fill the spot vacated by the sudden death of Virginia Rep. Gerry Connolly. Into the void jumped a pair of young, ambitious members — Jasmine Crockett of Texas and Robert Garcia of California — as well as a close Connolly ally, Stephen Lynch of Massachusetts. And then there's Mfume, who at 76 is making no bones about this being the capstone of a long career that included stints leading the Congressional Black Caucus and the NAACP — jobs he took back in the 1990s. 'I started a long time ago when dinosaurs roamed the earth,' Mfume joked in an interview, before describing his old-school approach to legislative relations: 'The first thing you learn is how to count votes, which has never failed me yet,' he said, adding that he would be careful not to alienate colleagues 'by doing something that causes problems for them in their district.' Rather than detail a point-by-point agenda for taking on President Donald Trump and congressional Republicans, Mfume said if elected he'd convene the committee's Democrats to decide a course of action. The party, he said, can only move forward with a 'consensus.' That style stands in sharp contrast to a Democratic base that's itching for more aggressive leadership and a more visible fight with Trump — something the other candidates are clearly heeding: Garcia has tangled with the Justice Department over his criticism of Elon Musk; Crockett has broached the prospect of a Trump impeachment inquiry; and Lynch, as the panel's interim top Democrat, attempted last week to subpoena Musk during a panel hearing. The race also threatens to become a proxy fight for broader questions about age and seniority inside the Democratic Party. House Democrats ousted several aging committee leaders at the end of last Congress as they girded for a fight with the Trump administration — and many in the base were disappointed when Connolly triumphed over Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York. The winner is poised to lead efforts to investigate and thwart the Trump administration if Democrats can retake the House majority next year — and ride herd on a chaotic panel that in recent months has featured intense personal attacks between lawmakers and the display of nude photos. 'It's a street fight every day,' said Rep. Lateefah Simon of California when asked about the panel and what it takes to lead it. 'It's every single day being able to expose the hypocrisy of this administration and to tell the truth.' There was a time when Mfume would have been a natural choice for such a moment. First elected to Baltimore's City Council at the age of 30, he quickly butted heads with legendary Mayor William Donald Schaefer. After longtime Rep. Parren Mitchell retired, Mfume easily won the seat in 1986 and within a few years become a national figure due to his chairmanship of the CBC. Ascending to that role just as Bill Clinton was elected to the presidency, he became an important power broker, forcing key concessions in Clinton's 1993 budget and pushing the White House to restore ousted Haitian president Jean-Bertrand Aristide to power. He also clashed with Clinton at times, including over his decision to pull the nomination of prominent Black legal scholar Lani Guinier to a top Justice Department post. But after Democrats lost their House majority in 1994 — and Mfume lost a quixotic bid to enter the party leadership — he decided two years later to forgo a long climb up the seniority ladder. He instead took the helm at the Baltimore-based NAACP, a job thought to better harness his skills at organizing and oratory. Former Maryland state Sen. Jill Carter said Mfume has long had the 'it factor' and 'charisma' that matters in politics. When Carter ran against Mfume in his 2020 House comeback bid, she got a reminder of how well her rival was known in the district and beyond: 'When some of my people did exit polling, they got the response, 'Oh, we love Jill but, come on, this is Kweisi.'' What's less clear is whether Mfume's reputation in Baltimore, burnished over 45 years in the public eye, makes him the man for the moment as far as his contemporary House colleagues are concerned. He's not known as a partisan brawler, and he said in the interview he doesn't intend to become one. 'There are always going to be fights and disagreements,' he said. 'It's kind of escalated in the last few years to a level that we haven't seen before. I think the main thing is to moderate and to manage the disagreements, because you're not going to cause any of them to go away. How you manage them and how they are perceived by the overall public is what makes a difference.' Mfume is leaning heavily, in fact, on the style and reputation of the man who filled the 7th District seat for the 24 years in between his House stints — the late Rep. Elijah Cummings, who served as top Democrat and then chair of Oversight during Trump's first term and is still spoken of in reverent terms inside the caucus. Mfume concedes that Cummings might have been the better communicator — he 'had a little more preacher in him than I do' — but said they share a similar lofty approach to politics. Like Cummings, he suggested prescription drug prices might be a committee priority. What Mfume is unlikely to have is the official support of the Congressional Black Caucus, a powerful force in intracaucus politics. With two members in the race — Crockett also belongs — Mfume said he does not expect a formal CBC endorsement after an interview process Wednesday. But he still expected to draw support from the bloc — especially its more senior members. Other factors complicate Mfume's candidacy. One is age: He is a year older than Connolly was when he was elected to lead Oversight Democrats last year. For those who prize seniority, Lynch has actually spent more time on the panel. And his 2004 departure from the NAACP was marred by controversy: The Baltimore Sun reported the executive committee of the group voted not to extend his contract under threat of a sexual harassment lawsuit; the NAACP later paid the woman who complained a $100,000 settlement. Mfume strenuously denied any wrongdoing, but while the episode has not emerged as a major issue in the Oversight race, some Democrats have privately expressed reservations about elevating a leader with personal baggage to potentially lead investigations of Trump. 'There's never been one person to corroborate that one allegation — not one,' Mfume said. About the payment, he said, 'I found out about it, quite frankly, after it happened.' Much of the Democratic Caucus remains undecided ahead of the June 24 secret-ballot vote. Candidates will first go before Democrats' Steering and Policy Committee, which will make a recommendation to the full caucus. 'I think that you have a situation where Mfume and Steve Lynch are getting support from folks who put seniority at top, and maybe the other two candidates would probably lean toward members who are newer, and then you got a whole host of folks that's in the middle. And I think that's where the battle is to see where they fall,' said Rep. Greg Meeks (D-N.Y.). One younger member said he was swayed by Mfume's experience. Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), who is 48 and had weighed his own bid, said that while other candidates were compelling, the Baltimorean had a 'leg up.' 'Kweisi shows me pictures of him with Nelson Mandela,' he said. 'I was like, I'm not going to run against Nelson Mandela's best friend.'
Yahoo
11 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Musk: I apologise for some of my Trump posts
Elon Musk has made a public apology to Donald Trump for posting incendiary comments on social media that imploded their relationship. The billionaire Tesla founder, who had been one of Mr Trump's closest advisers, called for the US president to be impeached and claimed he was named in the Epstein files. 'I regret some of my posts about President @realDonaldTrump last week. They went too far,' Mr Musk wrote on Wednesday morning. He did not specify which ones, although he has since deleted the claim about Mr Trump and Jeffrey Epstein. Mr Trump said that Mr Musk had 'lost his mind' in the meltdown, which started with a disagreement over the Republican's so-called 'big, beautiful' spending bill. Mr Musk had been hired as a 'special government employee' to head up the new Department of Government Efficiency (Doge), controversially tasked with downsizing the federal workforce and slashing spending. While he enjoyed some success in his mission, he was upset with Mr Trump's decision to open the spending taps in his bill, saying it was undoing his team's work. Mr Musk exited the White House at the end of May, ending a turbulent 130-day stint in Mr Trump's team, just days after he said he was 'disappointed' with the new budget. A acordial public farewell to the man who appointed himself as Trump's 'first buddy', both said Mr Musk would stay on as an adviser. He was handed a gold key to the White House. But the simmering dissent went public last week when the pair began trading insults online, with Mr Musk denouncing the president's budget as 'a disgusting abomination' that will bankrupt the US. The Tesla billionaire called on Americans to help 'kill the bill', which includes multi-trillion-dollar tax breaks and a boost to defence spending. Mr Trump was quick to hit back, claiming that the Tesla billionaire had been irked by the legislation ending tax credit worth billions of dollars to his electric vehicle company. Credit: Reuters Their spat rapidly intensified when Musk called for the president's impeachment and claimed the Republican was 'in the Epstein files' – the dossier of US government information held on the late paedophile financier. In response, Mr Trump threatened to cancel US government contracts with Mr Musk's companies, which include SpaceX. By Saturday, Musk had deleted the worst of his tweets, in an apparent sign he was hoping to repair the rift between them. Yet, the damage was done. Mr Trump declared his relationship with the South African-born tech tycoon was over and that he had 'no desire' to mend it, accusing Mr Musk of being 'disrespectful to the office of the President'. Mr Trump also warned that there would be 'serious consequences' if Mr Musk switched his allegiance to the Democrats and funded rival candidates who would vote against the bill. JD Vance, the US vice-president, said Mr Musk had made a 'huge mistake' in picking a fight with Mr Trump. Over the weekend, he said he hoped he would 'come back into the fold', but acknowledged that might be difficult after he went 'nuclear' during the row. Credit: YouTube/ Theo Von Mr Musk bankrolled Mr Trump's election run to the eye-watering tune of $250 million (£185 million) and was rewarded with his 'special government employee' role. For months after Mr Trump's inauguration, Mr Musk rarely left his side, travelling on Air Force One, moving into Mar-a-Lago and having the president babysit his four-year-old son in the Oval Office. The night of the election, Mr Trump declared of Musk 'a star is born'. Weeks later, Mr Musk confessed he loved the president 'as much as a straight man can love another man'. The messy breakdown of their bromance, however, had been heavily predicted. Mr Trump, who has now refocused attention elsewhere including to the deployment of troops to the LA riots, recently told reporters he wasn't even thinking of Mr Musk. According to reports, he is considering giving away the red Tesla he bought from Musk earlier this year. Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.
