- A bipartisan spending bill to avert a government shutdown was vanquished after Elon Musk and President-elect Donald Trump rebelled against it. Musk made his dissatisfaction known before Trump spoke out.
The richest man in the world spent his day yesterday blasting a bipartisan spending package aimed at averting a government shutdown. Elon Musk took to his social media platform X, calling it “one of the worst bills ever written,” and demanding “kill the bill.” He told his hundreds of millions of followers to call their elected representatives, and claimed any lawmaker who supported the continuing resolution (CR) should be voted out.
Kill the Bill https://t.co/D2Yntonrcv
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 18, 2024
Then President-elect Donald Trump tagged in. Trump, too, took to his social media platform Truth Social to advise Republicans to get smart and tough. “If Democrats threaten to shut down the government unless we give them everything they want, then CALL THEIR BLUFF,” he wrote. Trump said the bill would be “so destructive to our country,” and threatened any Republican who voted for it, saying they’d be “primaried.”
House Speaker Mike Johnson—who earlier defended the spending bill—scrapped it. Lawmakers now have two days to avert a partial government shutdown after the one-two punch that was Musk and Trump.
On Thursday morning before the bill was killed, Trump told Fox News that Johnson would “easily remain speaker” if he “acts decisively and tough” and gets rid of “all of the traps being set by Democrats” in the spending package. His tone seemed different from the friendly, somewhat viral photo of Johnson, Trump, his son, Musk, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on a jet eating McDonald’s on their way to a UFC fight post-election.
Make America Healthy Again starts TOMORROW. 🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/LLzr5S9ugf
— Donald Trump Jr. (@DonaldJTrumpJr) November 17, 2024
As for Musk, the Tesla chief executive threw his support behind Trump throughout the election—on the campaign trail, on X, appearing on podcasts, and appealing to his colleagues in tech and Silicon Valley. He also helped financially, to the tune of about $200 million via his America political action committee. After his election victory, Trump appointed Musk and rival turned endorser Vivek Ramaswamy to run a brand-new initiative called the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
Musk has appeared in photos at Mar-a-Lago frequently since the election—helping Trump with his transition and dining with foreign officials and other tech billionaires. Trump and Musk had dinner with Amazon executive chairman Jeff Bezos last night. There have been reports about Musk maybe overstaying his welcome or irritating those in Trump’s inner circle.
Musk has a far greater reach on X than Trump, let alone all of Congress, the Washington Post reported. The question is, will that at some point bother Trump? It remains to be seen.
Still, not everything Musk says goes. Musk wanted Cantor Fitzgerald chief executive Howard Lutnick to be Trump’s nominee for Treasury secretary. But Trump went with Scott Bessent, a hedge fund manager who spent years of his career at Soros Capital Management.
Notably, Musk and Trump appear to be misaligned on the run-up to Trump’s return to the Oval Office. Musk posted that no bills should be passed until Trump takes office for a second time in January. Trump, on the other hand, posted that “everything should be done, and fully negotiated, prior to my taking Office on January 20th, 2025.”
In a statement, Karoline Leavitt, a spokeswoman for the Trump–JD Vance transition, said: “As soon as President Trump released his official stance on the CR, Republicans on Capitol Hill echoed his point of view. President Trump is the leader of the Republican Party. Full stop,” referring to the spending bill. Tesla did not immediately respond to Fortune‘s request for comment.
