- President Trump is aware and apparently unfazed by the criticisms leveled at his administration that Tesla CEO Elon Musk is the true power in Washington, D.C. Trump’s former secretary of commerce previously told Fortune that the Trump/Musk partnership would stay sweet because the latter poses no threat.
President Donald Trump has continually pushed back on questions about how much power Tesla boss Elon Musk has in the White House, but the speculation is also a cause of concern for the entrepreneur.
Gibes have been leveled at the Trump administration that Musk, the richest man on the planet, is the person truly calling the shots in the Oval Office.
And while both the president and Musk admitted they had heard such speculation, it was the latter that picked up the phone to address the issue.
Speaking in a joint interview with Fox News yesterday, President Trump revealed, “Actually, Elon called me. He said, ‘You know, they’re trying to drive us apart.’ I said ‘Absolutely.’”
Musk does have an unusual amount of authority as a private citizen operating in the White House.
As the man leading the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), Musk and his team of engineering “geniuses” have been given varying levels of access to everything from Treasury data to aid spending.
On top of that, he’s been given the authority to slash hundreds of millions of dollars in government spending, and “delete” entire federal agencies as he sees fit. He’s also been handed the autonomy to axe vast swaths of the federal workforce, and up until recently was being trusted to manage his own conflicts of interest.
However, referring to headlines and commentary about Musk’s role in the administration, Trump continued, “It’s just so obvious. They’re so bad at it—I used to think they were good at it. They’re actually bad at it because if they were good at it, I’d never be president.”
The Republican politician went on to lament that “nobody in history” had received as much negative publicity as him.
“I could do the greatest things—I get 98% bad publicity,” President Trump continued. “It’s like, the craziest thing. But you know what I have learned, Elon? The people are smart, they get it. They really see what’s happening.”
Sources with insider knowledge of President Trump’s politicking said even before his inauguration that his partnership with Musk would not go awry—simply because the SpaceX founder poses no real threat.
“Both sides seem very well to recognize the fundamental truth [of] a remark that Trump made when asked about Musk as copresident,” Wilbur Ross, Trump’s former commerce secretary, told Fortune last month. “Trump said [Musk] is foreign-born and therefore knows he never could be president.”
The statement was “very wise,” Ross added, because “let’s pretend some other political leader was in the role of Musk and was taking as many strong opinions on as many different topics as Musk.
“There always would have been the potential for that person to challenge Trump in terms of politics. There is not that potential with Musk.”
Musk defending Trump
While those in the Trump camp are comfortable that no real threat can be posed by the South African–born X owner, Musk reveals he’s had a difficult time defending Trump to his friends.
The man worth $398 billion discussed what he called Trump Derangement Syndrome, describing a situation in which critics of the president have a strong negative reaction when endorsements of Trump are made.
“You can’t reason with people,” Musk told Fox News. “I was at a friend’s birthday party…it was a nice, quiet dinner and everyone was behaving normally. And then I happened to mention—this was before the election—the president’s name.
“It was like they got shot with a dart in the jugular that contained like methamphetamine and rabies.”
Musk then broke into a reenactment of an energetic, vaguely animalistic reaction. He added, “Like guys, you can’t have a normal conversation? It’s like they become completely irrational.”
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 18, 2025
