Trump’s team insists Elon Musk isn’t pulling the strings
After Republicans caved on Wednesday to multibillionaire Elon Musk’s demands that the House’s bipartisan spending bill be scrapped, Donald Trump’s flacks are scrambling to make it look like their Dear Leader is still in charge.
And they’re going to have to work even harder after the GOP-controlled House failed to pass the bill Trump supported Thursday night.
“As soon as President Trump released his official stance on the CR, Republicans on Capitol Hill echoed his point of view,” Trump spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt told Business Insider earlier in the day, before Trump’s preferred bill failed. “President Trump is the leader of the Republican Party. Full stop.”
The fact that the world’s richest man wrote “more than 150 separate posts on X” demanding the GOP scuttle the spending bill before Trump deigned to chime in tells a different story.
“It’s not Donald Trump asking for this. It’s very clearly President Elon Musk asking for this,” Democratic Rep. Dan Goldman told MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell Wednesday night. “The fact that Donald Trump has been completely AWOL during these negotiations to the point where only after Elon Musk publicly tweets about his displeasure about this budget deal, all of a sudden, Donald Trump, chief of staff to Elon Musk, comes trotting in and blows up the deal.”
The sad irony is that the bipartisan continuing resolution was filled with funding for farmers, infrastructure, and disaster relief—all of which would benefit Trump-voting Republicans.
The GOP created this crisis and now, a government shutdown is a real possibility—and the chaos continues with questions about whether or not Mike Johnson will remain House speaker. Prominent Republican lawmakers like Sen. Rand Paul and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene have even floated the idea that King Musk should become the next speaker.
“A nerve has been struck. Trump is intimidated by President Elon. Now he has his spokesperson out doing damage control cause Elon is calling the shots,” Democratic Rep. Maxwell Frost wrote on Bluesky. “Trump was silent on the bill until his boss, President Elon, spoke.”
Thoughts and prayers.
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