Musk says he regrets 'some' of his social media posts about Trump: 'They went too far'

National Post

a day ago

Elon Musk, who served as a close adviser and confidant to President Donald Trump until a bitter public falling out last week in a series of social-media posts, issued his strongest sign of contrition yet over how he handled the rupture.
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'I regret some of my posts about President @realDonaldTrump last week,' he said on his social-media platform, X. 'They went too far.'
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The dispute — which was triggered by Musk's opposition to the tax-cut bill Trump is pushing through Congress — posed a threat to Musk's wealth when the president raised the prospect of retaliating by cutting off his government contracts. That would have battered SpaceX, his rocket company, and Tesla Inc.'s stock price tumbled last Thursday, before recovering most of the loss.
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I regret some of my posts about President @realDonaldTrump last week. They went too far.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 11, 2025
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Tesla shares rose nearly 2% in premarket US trading on Wednesday after Musk's post. The stock was already rising in after-hours trading after Musk set June 22 as the tentative launch date for his long-awaited robot-taxi service. They had slid more than 19% so far this year as investors weighed up the damage from his previous embrace of Trump, which turned off car buyers across Europe and other markets, as well as the subsequent risks caused by his messy falling-out with the president.
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It remains unclear whether Musk's expressions of regret will do much to repair his relationship with Trump, who is known for carrying grudges and has been using the power of the federal government to lash out at those who have crossed him. That would seem to pose particular peril for Musk, given that SpaceX relies heavily on federal contracts and his businesses are subject to federal regulatory oversight.
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Trump has signaled little willingness to mend fences with Musk but told reporters that he felt they had once had a good relationship and 'I wish him well.' The president said in an NBC News interview Saturday that he had no interest in repairing the relationship.
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The scale of the blow-up had already cast significant doubt on whether the two will ever resume the close friendship they had during the first several months of Trump's second term, when Musk was a nearly ubiquitous presence in the White House's inner circle.
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Until he stepped down, ahead of the spat, Musk had led the so-called Department of Government Efficiency, which sought to slash spending, shutter agencies and cut the federal workforce. The department had aimed to generate $1 trillion of savings for the government but fell far short of that goal, producing just $180 billion by its own unverified accounting.
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Even that would be erased by Trump's tax bill, which would add $2.4 trillion to the government's budget deficits over the next decade, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. That caused Musk to previously lobby against its passage, calling it a 'disgusting abomination.'
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