Steve Bannon reveals the jaw-dropping hypocrisy of Elon Musk's attacks on Trump's 'big, beautiful bill'

Daily Mail​

01-07-2025

Steve Bannon continued his feud with Elon Musk, slamming the hypocrisy of the former 'First Buddy' for trashing the 'One Big, Beautiful Bill' and threatening to launch a third party.
The long-time Trump ally has been suspicious of Musk's place in Trump's orbit, referring to him as a 'parasitic illegal immigrant' while the Tesla CEO has called Bannon 'a criminal.'
As Musk continues to make threats against Trump's prized spending bill, Bannon ripped into the SpaceX leader on his show Monday, even suggesting Musk's beloved Department of Government Efficiency was worthless.
'Elon Musk is out and, it's not that I told you this was going to happen, but he's out lighting up the president and lighting up MAGA and claiming it's time for a third party,' Bannon said.
Bannon also reacted to Musk describing the Democrats and Republicans as unified as the 'Porky Pig Party' that controls the government, using the bill as an example, before having a crack at DOGE.
'And this is what galls me about this. This was the guy that told the president he was going to cut two trillion dollars of waste, fraud, and abuse, but then he backed it off to one trillion. And this was on an annual basis. This wasn't over 10 years,' Bannon said.
He derided 'fanboys' who claimed Musk got over $160billion of waste cut, but says 'we haven't seen' it.
'What we do have is a $9 billion rescission. And all of that is programmatic. I haven't seen anything specifically about fraud and abuse put forward from the Pentagon or anywhere.'
Musk's latest promise could throw a major wrench into Trump's governance plans for his second term.
The X CEO once more sounded off against the president's signature budget bill currently making its way through Congress.
'If this insane spending bill passes, the America Party will be formed the next day,' Musk pledged in a post on X Monday evening.
'Our country needs an alternative to the Democrat-Republican uniparty so that the people actually have a Voice,' he added.
A few hours before his new pledge to primary Republicans, Musk called out their refusal to pass legislation that he sees as sufficiently conservative via a post on X Monday afternoon, as senators voted on various amendments to Trump's budget package.
A full Senate vote on the budget bill is expected either late Monday evening or early Tuesday morning, as President Trump has been pushing Congress to get it to his desk by July 4th.
The Senate version of Trump's bill is estimated to add between 3.3 billion and 4.5 billion to the national debt.
'It is obvious with the insane spending of this bill, which increases the debt ceiling by a record Five Trillion Dollars that we live in a one-party country – the Porky Pig Party!!' Musk wrote on X.
Elon Musk via X
Elon Musk via X
Elon Musk via X
'Time for a new political party that actually cares about the people,' Musk added.
A few minutes later, Musk also called out several House Republicans who are a part of the conservative 'Freedom Caucus,' for their votes to pass the House version of the bill.
'How can you call yourself the Freedom Caucus if you vote for a Debt Slavery bill with the biggest debt ceiling increase in history? @RepAndyHarrisMD @chiproytx,' Musk wrote, addressing the two GOP lawmakers directly.
Musk then escalated his attacks further, pledging to oust Republicans from Congress who vote for the bill.
He said that any GOP lawmakers who 'campaigned on reducing government spending and then immediately voted for the biggest debt increase in history' while adding they 'should hang their head in shame!'
Musk, the world's richest man now worth over $400 billion, founded the AmericaPAC super pac in 2024.
AmericaPAC raised over $260 million last year, and spent it in support of Republicans, many of whom ran in swing districts. Over $88 million went to directly supporting Trump.
Musk was rewarded handsomely for his efforts, and spent nearly four months in Trump's White House as a 'special government employee' leading the Department of Government efficiency (DOGE).
In that role, he pinpointed many areas where the federal government could make budget cuts, but in Musk's eyes much of that work will be for nothing if the government doesn't curb its record high spending levels.
Some libertarian-minded Republicans have previously taken Musk's side in the GOP budget fight.
New additions to the the national debt were have been a non-starter for the likes of Kentucky Republican Rand Paul, who notes that he does want to see the 2017 tax cuts made permanent.
Paul also described the current $5 trillion in new debt that the budget bill would add as 'Biden spending levels.'
'This will be the largest increase in the debt ceiling ever in our history. We've never raised the debt ceiling without meeting the target. You can say it doesn't directly add to the debt but if you reach the ceiling you'll meet that. We won't discuss it for a year or two. I think it is a terrible idea to do this' Paul told Fox News earlier in June.
Paul has also contrasted the pending package with the funds anticipated to be saved by spending cuts pushed for by DOGE.
'That's more than all the DOGE cuts that we found so far. So, the increase in spending put into this bill exceeds the DOGE cuts. When you look just at the border wall, they have $46.5 billion for the border wall,' Paul said on Face the Nation earlier this month.
Utah GOP Senator Mike Lee is another Senate Republican who hasn't fully supported President Donald Trump's 'big, beautiful bill' of a spending package which is currently being voted on in the U.S. Senate after being passed by the House of Representatives back in May.
Lee and Musk previously joined forces to describe the bill as 'debt slavery' in a back and forth exchange on X.