Will Mr. Musk and Mr. Trump have a falling out?

In 1972, Henry Kissinger called the editor-in-chief of Time magazine and “begged” him to remove his name from the magazine’s joint “Man of the Year” list. The other was his boss, Richard M. Nixon. “It was almost suicidal for me to be treated as equal to the president of the United States,” Kissinger recalled. The magazine ignored Kissinger’s desperate pleas. The two officially shared the cover. The German-born national security adviser’s role in the all-important administration was too central to be ignored.

Eight weeks before Donald Trump was sworn in as president for the second time, the role fell to Elon Musk. President Trump’s vice president, J.D. Vance, is barely visible. Mr. Musk, on the other hand, is seen everywhere. From interviews at Mar-a-Lago for senior administration jobs to semi-secret meetings with Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations, Musk seems to have his nose in every pro-Trump pie. Mr. Musk even has the honor of having his theme song, David Bowie’s “Space Oddity,” played every time he enters the dining room at Mar-a-Lago. Trump, who operates an iPad during his musical flagship, is usually announced to the campaign’s somewhat counterintuitive music, Village People’s “YMCA,” a song long sung by the gay community.

The media began referring to Musk as Trump’s “co-president.” Mr. Musk is enjoying all the attention. No matter how wealthy Musk is (his net worth has soared to more than $300 billion since the election), his power will never match what is destined to be the most powerful imperial president in modern U.S. history. do not have. Mr. Trump does not like to stay in the spotlight for long periods of time. However, it seems likely that Mr. Musk has no idea how close he is to the sun. Musk has eaten with Trump, flown with Trump, played golf with Trump and is at Mar-a-Lago even when Trump is not around. “He loves this place,” President Trump quipped last week. “You can’t take him out of here. He just loves this place,” he added. I like him here too. ”

Mr. Trump owes a huge debt to Mr. Musk. In addition to the $119 million of his personal fortune he spent supporting the Trump campaign, Musk effectively gave $44 billion in in-kind donations by transferring his social media platform X to Trumpist causes (Musk The price he paid for his former Twitter account). . The site’s blatant algorithmic bias has led to a liberal exodus to Bluesky, which has more than doubled its user base to about 20 million people since September. As a clue as to what Trump might do next, Musk’s posts are now almost as suggestive as Trump’s infamous tweet of the night. Mr. Musk’s place in the hierarchy is perfectly illustrated by the now ubiquitous photo of him sitting next to Mr. Trump on the president-elect’s plane. Across from them are Donald Trump Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., all eating McDonald’s takeout. Standing behind them, straining to be included in the photo, is House Speaker Mike Johnson, third in line to the president. Vance, the second column, is not there.

In Trump’s world, diverting attention from the big shots is usually enough to cause a falling out. Mr. Trump is famous for exaggerating how often he appears on the cover of Time magazine (a measure of popularity that is now highly outdated). However, policy frictions are also visible. Mr. Musk intensively lobbied Howard Lutnick, the chief executive of the brokerage firm Cantor Fitzgerald, to become President Trump’s Treasury secretary. In return, Mr. Lutnick was given a strengthened U.S. Department of Commerce. It remains to be seen who will control the Ministry of Finance. If that person is Scott Bessent, George Soros’ former chief investment officer, it would be a sign that Musk doesn’t always get his way. Musk posted, somewhat flippantly, that Bessent represents “business as usual,” which is “driving America into bankruptcy.” Additionally, there is Musk’s interest in China. Musk, who operates a large Tesla factory in Shanghai, is an anti-decoupling leader in a highly hawkish government.

Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy will co-head the so-called “Government Efficiency Unit.” The department is a non-governmental arm that claims to have the authority to dismantle Washington government agencies and cut spending. The Governor-General has no formal authority. But Mr. Musk’s megaphone is probably the largest in the world, and only Mr. Trump can claim to have a bigger megaphone. Even if Mr. Musk realizes that his bullish pulpit is no match for the power of Congress’s closely guarded wallets, he is unlikely to quietly concede the fight. At some point, President Trump will have to decide who will win. Don’t bet on Mr. Musk.

So instead of watching it in slow motion, you’re watching a train wreck in progress. Hannah, you covered Musk’s Twitter takeover and watched him break a plate. He fired 80 percent of the social media company’s staff, including content moderators, and believes that experience is a template for how to reform the U.S. federal government. What does this tell us about how long he will last with President Trump? Are there similarities between other US presidents and the plutocrats of the day?

Recommended reading

This week’s column examines President Trump’s plan to dismantle the administrative state, a project with which Mr. Musk is intimately involved. The high ratio of charlatans to ordinary people in Mr. Trump’s selections should be seen as a clear sign of his intentions. “Rome was not destroyed by outsiders,” I wrote. “It was the work of barbarians from within.”

Also read my colleague Tabby Kinder on another Trump deal. Palantir is a company co-founded by Peter Thiel, a Silicon Valley liberal and fellow Trump supporter. The company’s market valuation has increased by $23 billion since Nov. 5, and it now exceeds Lockheed Martin. Palantir, along with privately held Anduril and other technology companies, is part of a new military-industrial complex. Please observe carefully.

Finally, read Stanford University’s Rose Gottemoeller on how President Trump will need concessions from Putin to resolve the Ukraine issue. That “may come true soon.” Gottemoeller’s widely read FT op-ed was published just days before Joe Biden lifted limits on the range of artillery the U.S. supplies to Ukraine, which could help Trump.

Hannah Murphy answers

When Ed posed the question to my team, my esteemed colleague Richard Waters said that although the bromance has been going on for a long time, he thinks it’s going to “keep going.” I’m not so sure about their marriage of convenience.

By all accounts, Mr. Musk’s cost-cutting drive on Twitter was frenetic and focused on short-term results. After drastically reducing its workforce, the company was forced to plead for the reinstatement of some of its laid-off staff, who turned out to have important knowledge about operating the platform. In other locations, staff sometimes simply refused to pay vendors. One source said Musk kept saying in his office, “Let’s sue!” (Spoiler alert: some people did)

To do Twitter’s dirtiest work, Musk relied on a small group of sycophants who chose to sleep on the floor of Twitter headquarters to demonstrate their dedication. Mr. Musk has already sought similar loyalty in his job listing for president, which calls for “ultra-high IQ small-government revolutionaries willing to work 80+ hours a week to cut modest costs.” .

But the transition from bulldozing platforms owned by Mr. Musk to potentially confronting Congress and, more importantly, “managing” Mr. Trump, requires that Mr. It will require an unfamiliar sensibility. Will he be able to learn to shut up, to tweet, and become a prankster? Ahead of the election, during an audio town hall with the president-elect on X, Musk could already be heard trying to rein in some of Trump’s outspoken claims, to little effect.

I can’t think of any example of a plutocrat getting the president’s ear this way, and certainly not Silicon Valley egos. Due to their paranoid and capricious nature, divorce is a sure thing. The question is how messy it gets.

your feedback

Now, a word from our Swampian. . .

Answer to “Should tech giants be treated like nation-states?”
“I have to admit, I slightly disagree with your opinion (which is why I loved this article!).

While high-tech companies lack the legitimacy of democratic delegation, governments are losing legitimacy by losing effectiveness. On the other hand, private companies can be surprisingly effective (think of SpaceX doing things that only governments could do decades ago).

Governments just don’t have the capacity they did from the 1930s to the 1960s (nor do academia, I would argue). To maintain its own legitimacy, governments need to learn from the private sector about how things are done and how they hire people (and how academic institutions hire people and how that is reflected in government). , I think that requires respect from democratically elected leaders. ” — Buzz M. Barstow