5 winners from the Trump-Musk breakup
The vicious blow-up between President Trump and Elon Musk has shaken up the power dynamics in Washington, D.C.
As Musk burns his bridges to the White House and MAGA world, several of his political and business rivals stand to benefit. And while Musk's enemies may relish his ouster, some of Trump's biggest rivals could also gain from the president's feud with the world's richest man.
Here are the people, businesses and factions that could win from Musk's loss.
Musk's alienation from Trump gives Jeff Bezos a major opportunity to improve his tumultuous relationship with the president and fuel the growth of Blue Origin, his aerospace company.
Even before Musk's alignment with Trump, he and Bezos butted heads for years as the billionaires dueled each other for dominance over the private sector space race.
At the same time, Bezos was fending off Trump's attacks on the Washington Post and facing off with the administration in court.
Musk's SpaceX had already cemented itself as the industry leader before joining forces with Trump, far outpacing Blue Origin in total launches while also servicing the International Space Station.
But Musk's growing ties to Trump threatened to deepen SpaceX's connection to the government and siphon billions of dollars in federal contracts away from Blue Origin.
With Musk out of Trump's good graces, Bezos now has an opening to build on months of work to curry the president's favor.
Ahead of the 2024 election, Bezos spiked the Post's pending endorsement of former Vice President Harris, a move critics derided as self-interested. In an op-ed for the Post, Bezos said that his decision was made based on editorial principle alone, but acknowledged how his business empire has become a 'complexifier' for the paper.
Amazon was also one of several major tech companies to donate $1 million to Trump's inauguration, and inked a documentary deal with Melania Trump reportedly worth $40 million.
Musk's exit is another win for Boeing after months of progress moving forward from a series of scandals and safety lapses.
As Boeing faced federal investigations into its safety protocols for commercial aircraft, it also suffered an embarrassing setback in its spacecraft efforts during the Biden administration.
Astronauts Butch Willmore and Suni Williams spent months stuck on the ISS after taking off from Earth on Boeing's Starliner in June 2024. What was supposed to be a week-long mission turned into a nine-month ordeal in which several Starliner maintenance issues delayed their return to Earth.
Former President Biden rejected Musk's offer to bring Wilmore and Williams home with the SpaceX Dragon, but the administration refused amid its own feud with the tech CEO. The Biden administration held an electric vehicle summit earlier in his term, but snubbed Musk, sending the Tesla CEO on his path toward endorsing Trump.
Wilmore and Williams finally returned to Earth in March after Trump dispatched the Dragon to bring them back.
Musk threatened Thursday to ground the Dragon amid Trump's threats to scrap SpaceX's federal contracts, which would have debilitated the U.S. space program. While Musk has since pulled back from that threat, his feud with Trump gives Boeing an opening to move forward from the Starliner mishap.
Before this week, Musk's most notable falling out with an ally may have been his feud with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman.
Musk, one of the co-founders of the nonprofit artificial intelligence (AI) firm behind ChatGPT, has battled Altman in the courts and on the Internet over his leadership. He had consistently criticized Altman for plans to make OpenAI a for-profit business — plans that have since been scrapped — and sued the company for an alleged breach of its commitments.
Musk has also launched xAI, one of several rivals to OpenAI, and incorporated the Grok chatbot into X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter.
Trump, however, ignored Musk's disdain for Altman and made OpenAI a major player in Project Stargate, his effort to build out AI data and energy centers.
Musk was forced to abide Trump's partnership with Altman, and the president dismissed his adviser's beef with OpenAI when touting the benefits of the deal.
'No it doesn't. He hates one of the people in the deal,' Trump said in January when asked if Musk's criticism bothered him.
'I've spoken to Elon. I've spoken to all of them, actually. The people in the deal are very, very smart people,' Trump continued. 'But Elon, one of the people in the deal he happens to hate, but I have certain hatreds of people too.'
With Altman's arch rival out of the White House, the path is clear for an even bigger role in Trump's efforts to boost AI.
While Musk shared Trump's support for stricter border security, he spent his stint with the president at odds with some of the Trump's closest advisers and major MAGA movement leaders.
Even before Trump took office, a war over H-1B visas erupted between Musk and several Trump allies, who are fiercely opposed to courting immigrants and back Trump's severe immigration restrictions.
Musk squared off with former Trump strategist Steve Bannon and right-wing activist Laura Loomer over the H-1B program.
'I will go to war on this issue the likes of which you cannot possibly comprehend,' Musk, reportedly a former H-1B recipient, wrote in one of several posts on the social platform X defending the visas.
While the tech CEO said H-1Bs were essential for U.S. competitiveness, Bannon and Loomer accused Musk of supporting a 'scam' that would undermine Trump's America First platform.
Musk has also butted heads with Stephen Miller, a top Trump White House policy advisor and the architect of much of the president's immigration restriction agenda. In recent days, Miller has been front and center in defending Trump's tax cut and spending bill, the measure behind the rupture between Musk and Trump.
'The reconciliation bill cuts taxes, seals the border and reforms welfare. It is not a spending bill. There is no 'pork.' It is the campaign agenda codified,' Miller said on X Thursday, a clear swipe at Musk, if not by name.
Bannon has gone even further, urging Trump to seize control of SpaceX and deport Musk, a native of South Africa, citing allegations his legal status in the country had lapsed.
Democrats have had a miserable start to 2025, but the Musk-Trump feud is undoubtedly good news for the time being.
The messy online battle between Trump and Musk gave Democrats some relief from months of ineffectual attempts to impede the president's agenda, recriminations over the 2024 election, divisions about their future and a lack of clear leadership, resulting in historic unpopularity.
'Oh, man, the girls are fighting, aren't they?' Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) quipped Thursday. 'We'll see what the impacts are of it legislatively.'
Trump, eager to quash a distraction from his legislative push, sought Friday to ice the feud with Musk and move forward. But one first-term Trump White House aide said Musk's alienation could lead to further fractures in the GOP, which could give Democrats some room to breathe after a brutal six-month stretch.
'We think we've seen some real legislative gridlock—but with new life and momentum breathed into the Freedom Caucus' power, I don't think we've seen anything yet,' the former White House aide said.
'At a time when Republicans need to be united more than ever, the most dangerous faction I've seen could be accelerating quickly—and congressional leadership may soon find they have less control than ever.'
Democrats were already banking on Musk being an electoral liability in next year's midterm elections, though were wary of drawing his money into the race. If Musk follows through on threats to punish Republicans who voted for Trump's bill, the divided field could boost Democrats even further.
'He's already suggested Republicans wouldn't have kept the House without his help, and while he previously downplayed any plans to get politically involved, that's harder to believe as the rhetoric between him and Trump heats up,' the former White House aide said.
'The midterms are a prime opportunity to back up that claim—and in swing districts where a couple million dollars can tip the scales, his involvement could be a game-changer.'
Alex Gangitano contributed
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