Top Trump aide lifts lid on his 'body check' fight with Elon Musk and calls him a 'Viking'

Daily Mail​

4 hours ago

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Wednesday spoke about his clash with Elon Musk at the White House, which famously leaked out into the press and drew widespread speculation about Musk's future at the White House.
The Treasury Secretary tried to downplay the outburst, saying they were both on the same team.
'We have had disagreements, but we both want to get to the same place,' Bessent said to New York Post podcast host Miranda Devine on Monday. 'We both want to eliminate the waste, fraud and abuse in government.'
Bessent and Musk famously got into a shouting match in April over who had the authority to appoint as head of the IRS. The Treasury Secretary chalked up their feud to a difference in strategies.
'The Silicon Valley mode of operation is move quickly and break things. I always say here at Treasury we move deliberately and fix things,' he said.
He compared their differences to different fighting styles.
'I think Elon's probably fancies himself more of a Viking. I think I'm more of a ninja,' he said.
Bessent said that the attempts by leftwing activists and the press to vilify Musk was part of the reason he was upset.
'He was vilified by the press, by the Tesla customers, and I think that probably put stress on him,' he said.
Musk left the White House at the end of May after his 130 day period as a special advisor was concluded.
But Bessent said the Trump administration would continue Musk's mission at DOGE.
'I think of DOGE as an ethos and to the extent that Elon has departed physically, I think that ethos is there and the momentum for what he's done yield bigger and bigger savings over time.'
In April, Trump's former Chief Strategist Steve Bannon told DailyMail.com that Musk's physically 'shoved' 62-year-old Treasury Secretary after he was confronted over wild promises to save the administration 'a trillion dollars '.
'Scott Bessent called him out and said, "You promised us a trillion dollars (in cuts), and now you're at like $100 billion, and nobody can find anything, what are you doing?"' Bannon said.
'And that's when Elon got physical. It's a sore subject with him,' he continued. 'It wasn't an argument, it was a physical confrontation. Elon basically shoved him.'
Trump confirmed the clash in June between his two billionaire advisors but denied that it got physical.
'They did have an argument, but I didn't see a lot of physicality there,' he said.
Bessent boasted in the podcast interview that blue collar wages under President Trump had risen significantly since he took office.
'We've seen real wages for hourly workers, non supervisory workers, rise almost two percent in the past five months, no president has done that before,' he said.
Bessent credited Trump's commitment to manufacturing and deportation of illegal immigrants as the reason for growth.