Musk Pitches White House Role in Glitchy Trump Interview

(Bloomberg) — Elon Musk pitched a role for himself cutting federal spending in a second Donald Trump administration, an indication of how the world’s richest man is increasingly injecting himself into US politics.

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Musk on Monday held a conversation with the Republican nominee on the tech mogul’s X platform. But the highly anticipated discussion was delayed by more than 40 minutes as users received error messages, an embarrassing blow to Musk’s social-media site.

The billionaire entrepreneur blamed the delay on a cyber attack, without providing any evidence, and when the event started suggested opponents of Trump’s political message were responsible.

Still, it offered Trump an audience of more than one million, according to X, during a critical moment in the election as the Republican nominee seeks to steady a presidential bid thrown off course by his Democratic rival, Vice President Kamala Harris.

It also gave Musk an opening to increase his influence with Trump if the former president returns to power. He called for a government commission to ensure that taxpayer money is spent effectively and pitched himself for a role in such an effort.

“I’d be happy to help out on such a commission — I’d love if it were formed,” Musk said.

Trump praised the idea, calling Musk “the greatest cutter.”

New Alliance

Musk endorsed Trump for president last month, part of a shift that has seen the Tesla Inc. and SpaceX chief executive officer publicly embrace right-leaning causes and candidates to make his mark on the political scene.

An already formidable Washington presence, with companies boasting sizable government contracts, Musk is poised to be an even bigger player if Trump returns to power. He’s grown closer to the GOP nominee in recent months, advising him on electric vehicles and cryptocurrency policy — a reversal from a once-rocky relationship that saw the two trade insults.

Highlighting Musk’s growing sway with Trump, the former president, long a critic of electric vehicles, praised the EV maker, saying Tesla’s cars are “incredible.”

Trump and Musk’s conversation comes at a critical point in the 2024 race, with less than three months to Election Day. Harris’ ascent to the top of the Democratic ticket has shaken up the race with polls showing she has erased the lead Trump held for much of the summer and pulled ahead in fundraising.

Musk, who tops the Bloomberg Billionaires Index with a net worth of $227.3 billion, aims to use his vast fortune to swing the race for Trump. He created a super political action committee backing the Republican nominee.

Musk served on White House advisory councils when Trump was president, but left after the Republican decided to withdraw from the landmark Paris climate accord. Musk’s stint on the councils was mired in controversy as supporters urged him to step down.

The event included many of Trump’s stock lines from his rallies, including insulting Harris’ intelligence, calling for a mass deportation of migrants and boasting about his relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

But despite a friendly setting hosted by one of his most prominent backers, Trump broke little new ground, and the attention was as much on Musk as the former president. The two have much in common, both outspoken presences on social media and in apparent alignment on many issues.

Musk, like Trump, has criticized illegal immigration across the US-Mexico border and promoted conspiracy theories that Democrats are encouraging migration to bring in people to vote fraudulently in the 2024 election.

Tech Glitch

The technical mishap on X, which delayed the start of the event, drew comparisons to the glitches that foiled the launch of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis’s ill-fated presidential campaign last year, as servers struggled to handle surging demand.

The late start was a blow to Musk’s X and the billionaire tech mogul whose site has faced technical problems and scrutiny since he purchased the platform, then known as Twitter, in 2022.

“This massive attack illustrates there’s a lot of opposition to people just hearing what President Trump has to say,” Musk said when the event finally began. “This is really aimed at kind of open-minded, independent voters who are trying to make up their mind.”

Senior Trump campaign official Chris LaCivita responded to an X user urging Trump to “break the internet,” by saying that Trump “did.”

Trump was banned from the platform after the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol, but had his account restored after Musk bought the company.

Trump returned to X in August 2023, posting his mug shot after being indicted in Fulton County, Georgia on charges related to his efforts to overturn the 2020 election result, but has preferred to use his own social-media site, Truth Social. On Monday, however, Trump posted several times to X, including a campaign video.

(Updates throughout)