Trump’s 'vapid' Musk interview put his 'bile and paranoia' on full display: Bloomberg editor

13 August 2024

On Monday night, former President Donald Trump joined Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk for a lengthy talk on X (formerly Twitter). Timothy L. O'Brien, Bloomberg's senior executive opinion editor, wrote that the conversation was little more than a "bro-fest" that illustrated why the ex-president shouldn't return to the White House.

In his Tuesday column, O'Brien described the back-and-forth — which started more than 40 minutes late — as an "exceptionally vapid and propagandistic" event with little discussion of actual concrete policies. He additionally described the talk as a "bookend" to the ex-president's "unhinged" hour-long press conference last week at his Mar-a-Lago estate, in which he aired grievances and made dozens of baseless and debunked claims.

"Taken together, both events also are stark reminders that Trump doesn’t really sit for interviews or conduct press conferences. He convenes group therapy sessions with the public, using everyone’s time to sort through the skein of insecurities, instabilities and inanities that inevitably cling to him," O'Brien wrote. "He and Musk are entitled to engage in their odd carny acts, of course, but the White House is up for grabs and juvenile delinquents preoccupied with conspiracies aren’t reliable stewards of the ship of state."

Musk's conversation with the former president never took a combative tone, as the billionaire tech entrepreneur has already made a significant donation to a pro-Trump super PAC. The Wall Street Journal later reported that the X owner committed to funding the PAC with $45 million every month until the election (Musk later denied that report, calling it "fiction").

Musk has also made the hashtags #Trump2024 and #MAGA promoted hashtags on his social media platform, with the latter automatically generating a custom emoji of Trump raising his fist after the attempt on his life at a Pennsylvania rally. Trump has even started posting on X once again, after Musk re-activated his account in 2023 (Trump's Twitter account was permanently suspended in 2021 after the January 6 insurrection).

O'Brien opined that Trump agreeing for the sit-down with Musk marked an effort for him to steer the news cycle in his direction after President Joe Biden suddenly exited the 2024 race and threw his weight behind Vice President Kamala Harris. He added that the 45th president of the United States' campaign has taken on a more panicked tone as newer polls show him trailing Harris in several critical battleground states.

"Trump has always lashed out when cornered, in his personal, business and political lives. But the bile and paranoia he’s unleashed lately is of a different caliber, stoked by misgivings about Vice President Kamala Harris’s sudden ascent and presidential campaign," he wrote. "Uncertain how to respond substantively to her candidacy, he’s defaulted to racism and loony claims that she’s using artificial intelligence to inflate attendance at her rallies."

Musk frequently heaped praise on Trump throughout their conversation, calling him an "interesting character" and offering to help a potential second Trump administration with a government efficiency panel should he win the November election (Musk fired 80% of Twitter's employees after he bought the platform). He then commented that America would be in "massive trouble, frankly, with a Kamala [Harris] administration."

"If we have a Democrat at this moment as a president I don’t think our country can survive," Trump said.

O'Brien noted that while the conversation was light on specifics and that Trump's speech was "frequently slurry," the stakes of the 2024 election "couldn't be higher" given that the world's wealthiest man was so fervently committed in his support for the ex-president.

"[W]hat’s already landed should prompt voters to recognize that the man aspiring to the highest office in the land is teetering — while also being propped up by the Musks of the world," he wrote.

Click here to read O'Brien's column in full (subscription required).

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