President Donald Trump said he hopes Elon Musk's businesses do well as Tesla suffers its second straight losing quarter, the Washington Times reported. This comes after Musk fired parting shots as he was leaving as head of the Department of Government Efficiency.
The Tesla mogul supported Trump during the 2024 campaign and helped carry get him back into the White House. Then Musk worked to cut government waste through DOGE.
However, things grew tense after he denigrated Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill, which will slash electric vehicle subsidies starting Sept. 30. Meanwhile, Musk’s Tesla sales dipped 16% in market share over last year.
For his part, Trump said in a social media post Thursday that he hopes Musk will continue to do well. Later remarks from Musk demonstrate that he wasn’t convinced as it appears this feud will continue.
The president’s post to Truth Social championed Musk’s continued success regardless of the legislation. “Everyone is stating that I will destroy Elon’s companies by taking away some, if not all, of the large scale subsidies he receives from the U.S. Government,” Trump began.
“This is not so! I want Elon, and all businesses within our Country, to THRIVE, in fact, THRIVE like never before!” Trump continued.
“The better they do, the better the USA does, and that’s good for all of us. We are setting records every day, and I want to keep it that way!” Trump concluded.
Shortly after Trump’s overtures toward him, Musk posted a response on X, formerly Twitter. “The ‘subsidies’ he’s talking about simply do not exist,” Musk claimed.
He said Trump “has already removed or put an expiry date on all sustainable energy support while leaving massive oil & gas subsidies untouched.” He then went on to point out how one of his other companies helped the country while receiving government money.
“SpaceX won the NASA contracts by doing a better job for less money. Moving those contracts to other aerospace companies would leave astronauts stranded and taxpayers on the hook for twice as much!” Musk claimed.
According to the New York Post, Musk’s companies raked in $38 billion in taxpayer dollars since 2007 with the majority being awarded in the last five years. SpaceX alone has secured billions in Department of Defense and NASA contracts.
These two will likely continue to spar over government waste and the role of subsidies. However, it seems that saving money for the American people is never the losing bet, even if Musk doesn’t like it.
