Thanks to a bipartisan spending deal, lawmakers in the U.S. House of Representatives appeared to be on track to avoid a federal government shutdown before a Saturday, December 21 deadline.
But the deal ran into problems after Tesla/SpaceX CEO Elon Musk railed against it on X, formerly Twitter. And Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont) is slamming House Republicans for being influenced by him.
In a Wednesday, December 18 tweet, Musk — who President-elect Donald Trump has picked to head a new agency that would be called the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) — wrote, "Any member of the House or Senate who votes for this outrageous spending bill deserves to be voted out in 2 years!"
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Musk, in a separate tweet, posted, "Please call your elected representatives right away to tell them how you feel! They are trying to get this passed today while no one is paying attention."
Sanders responded with a December 18 tweet of his own, writing, "Democrats and Republicans spent months negotiating a bipartisan agreement to fund our government. The richest man on Earth, President Elon Musk, doesn't like it. Will Republicans kiss the ring? Billionaires must not be allowed to run our government."
The following day on X, Axios' Mike Allen weighed in on Musk's role in sinking the bill.
Allen posted, "A Trump source tells @axios @JimVandeHei & me yesterday's @elonmusk @X storm, which sunk a huge spending bill, is the new playbook: GOP lawmakers got "instant and overwhelming feedback. Before, it had to be slowly funneled through conservative press. Now there is a megaphone."
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