Trump Says He Would Give Elon Musk a Top Role in His Administration

Naomi LaChance
·3 min read
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Former President Donald Trump said he would consider appointing Elon Musk, the world’s richest person, as an adviser or cabinet member in his administration if he is elected.

“He’s a very smart guy. I certainly would, if he would do it, I certainly would. He’s a brilliant guy,” Trump told Reuters on Monday.

Musk posted on his website, X, formerly Twitter, “I am willing to serve” with an AI-generated image of himself at a podium.

Last month, the Tesla CEO endorsed Trump and said he is leading a super PAC called America PAC to raise money for Trump. News reports said that he would be donating $45 million a month to the super PAC, but Musk denied it.

Trump also floated the idea of appointing Musk in May. The Wall Street Journal reported that the two talk several times a month, and have discussed immigration, technology, and the U.S. Space Force.

More recently, Musk interviewed Trump on X Spaces with Trump earlier this month, although the stream was delayed due to technical difficulties.

During the interview, Trump complimented Musk for firing workers who were on strike. “You’re the greatest cutter,” Trump said. “You just walk in and you just say, ‘You wanna quit?’ They go on strike, I won’t mention the name of the company, but they go on strike and you say, ‘That’s OK, you’re all gone … Every one of you is gone.’”

In response, the United Auto Workers filed federal labor charges against Musk and Trump for an attempt to “intimidate and threaten” workers.

Vice President Kamala Harris posted a “statement on… whatever that was” following the event. “Trump’s entire campaign is in service of people like Elon Musk and himself — self-obsessed rich guys who will sell out the middle class and who cannot run a livestream in the year 2024,” the campaign wrote.

As recently as two years ago, Trump and Musk were volleying insults at each other. In July 2022, Musk posted on X that“it’s time for Trump to hang up his hat & sail into the sunset.”

Later that same day, Trump posted on the social media site Truth Social: “When Elon Musk came to the White House asking me for help on all of his many subsidized projects, whether it’s electric cars that don’t drive long enough, driverless cars that crash, or rocketships to nowhere, without which subsidies he’d be worthless, and telling me how he was a big Trump fan and Republican, I could have said, ‘drop to your knees and beg,’ and he would have done it.”

But last month at a rally, Trump spoke of Musk affectionately: “I love Elon Musk,” he said.

Musk is also the CEO of SpaceX, a spacecraft manufacturer that contracts with the government. The Pentagon uses one of their rockets to send satellites into space. According to Reuters, SpaceX is also building a classified network of spy satellites with a U.S. intelligence agency.

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