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Elon Musk, already the richest man in the world, has secured an unelected position at the right hand of the president of the United States, with office space in the West Wing… and he could throw it away over a petty dispute. Following the Trump administration’s announcement of the $500 billion “Stargate” AI infrastructure project, Musk turned to X to scrap the inclusion of OpenAI, a move that reportedly pissed off some Trump staffers.
According to Politico, White House staff believe Musk went too far by publicly accusing OpenAI of not having the money needed to hold up its end of the deal for a $100 billion investment in the Stargate initiative.
A Trump ally told Politico that “it’s clear he has abused proximity to the president” in his attack on Altman, which quickly went from “they don’t have the money” to portraying Altman as a cowardly flip-flop who trashed to Trump. during his first term, but now he is fawning over him. And you know what? Fair blow. Musk could be a guy who says the teapot is black, since resign from the first Trump administration for a principled position he apparently no longer occupies, but Altman is also a little worm. Sometimes just knowing one is enough.
Unfortunately for Trumpworld, they don’t seem to have any mechanism to stop Musk from doing things like this, even when it’s at the expense of the administration’s accomplishments. A Trump ally told Politico: “The problem is that the president has no influence over him and Elon doesn’t give a damn.”
Trump himself appeared to downplay the incident, telling reporters that he doesn’t mind Musk criticizing the project because he “hates one of the people in the deal.” But around him, it seems that patience for Musk’s antics might be wearing out a little. Even White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, although she avoided directly invoking Musk, said during a Fox News interview that “the American people should accept the words of President Trump and those CEOs” regarding their investments in Stargate.
Musk is a unique problem for Trumpworld: a guy who arguably has as much, if not even greater, reach than the president himself and who controls the levers of the same platform Trump once used. dictate your policy directly. Between the pettiness and the continuous tweet bombardments that can control media cycles, it’s like having to deal with another Trump, if that other Trump were a much richer and much worse cartel.
Trump may not have much influence over Musk right now, as he probably still feels like he owes him some loyalty for the huge amount of money Musk spent to boost Trump’s campaign. But to suggest he has none could mean Trumpworld is underestimating his influence. Musk’s empire is based on government subsidies and federal contracts. It wouldn’t be too difficult to cause some pain if they really wanted to. If Musk continues to exaggerate, we will see how strong this association is.
