President Trump and tech billionaire Elon Musk sat down for a joint interview with Fox Information’ Sean Hannity the place they defended the administration’s large overhaul of the federal authorities and gave some insights into their friendship.
The interview was the newest show of Trump placing Musk within the highlight following an Oval Workplace look by the Tesla CEO final week wherein he fielded a number of questions from reporters whereas the president sat on the Resolute Desk.
Hannity, who supplied each males reward in the course of the interview, at one level assessed: “I feel like I’m interviewing two brothers here.”
Listed here are 4 takeaways from the interview.
Musk responds to Democratic assaults
Musk responded to pushback he has confronted since spearheading the Trump administration’s efforts to supply buyouts to federal staff and to search out methods to chop waste and fraud at businesses, blaming the paperwork for the criticism.
“If the bureaucracy is fighting the will of the people and preventing the president, the president from implementing what the people want, then what we live in is a bureaucracy and not a democracy,” Musk mentioned.
Hannity rattled off quite a lot of criticisms Democrats had for Musk, together with claims he’s inflicting a Constitutional disaster, that DOGE is performing illegally, and that Democrats are calling Musk a “vernacular for a male body part.”
“Why? Why are they reacting like this?” Musk mentioned.
“All we’re really trying to do here is restore the will of the people through the president. And, and what we’re finding is that there’s an unelected bureaucracy. Speaking of unelected… there’s a vast federal bureaucracy that is implacably opposed to the president and the cabinet. And if you look at, say, D.C. voting, it’s 92 percent Kamala,” Musk added, referring former Vice President Harris profitable Washington, D.C. by 92 p.c in November.
A variety of federal staff additionally dwell in surrounding Virginia and Maryland, which Harris additionally gained however not by as a lot.
The SpaceX CEO additionally bashed the Biden administration, arguing that it didn’t act in a reliable or caring method and that it lied to the American public.
“In order to save the taxpayer money, it comes down to two things, competence and caring,” Musk mentioned.
“And the problem is that the American taxpayer has been getting a terrible deal because look at the last administration,” he added.
Hannity replied, “But they lied to us and said that Joe didn’t have a cognitive decline,” referring to Biden’s cognitive skills that got here into query within the weeks earlier than he dropped out of the 2024 race.
“They fully lied,” Musk responded, earlier than including “They flat out lied, it’s insane” when Hannity introduced up the border.
Trump has reward for Musk
Trump had excessive reward for Musk all through the interview, highlighting his profitable tech profession and his intelligence.
The president famous he was impressed with Musk when he noticed that Musk’s staff had the power to catch a rocket booster as an alternative of getting it crash into the ocean.
“Something that had an effect on me was when I saw the rocket ship come back and get grabbed, like, you grab a beautiful little baby, you grab your baby… you can’t really have a rocket program if you’re going to dump $1 billion into the ocean every time you fly, you have to save it. And he saved it,” Trump mentioned.
He added that Russia and China don’t have something akin to Musk’s rocket program.
Within the interview, the president additionally credited Musk as a serious key in direction of implementing the handfuls of government orders he has signed since taking workplace.
“You write a beautiful executive and you sign it, you assume it’s going to be done but it’s not,” Trump mentioned, including that Musk works with “100 geniuses” at DOGE to implement his agenda.
“He’s got some very brilliant young people working for him that dress much worse than him, actually,” Trump mentioned in jest. “They dress in just t-shirts. You wouldn’t know they have 180 IQ,” the president mentioned. “But he gets it done. He’s a leader. He gets it done.”
Musk solidified Trump assist after Butler
Musk mentioned he would have endorsed Trump regardless within the 2024 election however that an assassination on Trump’s life in Butler, Pa. in July sped up that course of.
“Well, I was going to do it anyway, but that was a precipitating event,” Musk advised Hannity.
“That speeded it up a little bit,” Trump mentioned and Musk agreed.
Trump replied, “I didn’t know that.”
“It sped it up, but I was going to do it anyway,” Musk mentioned.Musk endorsed Trump simply after the assassination try, sharing his assist for the then GOP-nominee on his social platform, X. He shared a video on the time of Trump standing and elevating his fist, with a bloody ear following a taking pictures at an outside rally as he was being hauled away by Secret Service.
Trump believes Musk will discover $1T in DOGE cuts
Trump mentioned he believes Musk will be capable to discover $1 trillion in cuts to the federal authorities, after DOGE decided on Tuesday it has discovered $55 billion in financial savings within the final month.
“As good as they are, they’re not going to find some contract that was crooked, you know crooked as hell. And I mean this going to be so much that isn’t found. But, what is that I think he’s going to find $1 trillion,” Trump mentioned.
“Yeah, I think so,” Musk agreed.
The tech billionaire mentioned that his aim is to “try to get $1 trillion out of the deficit” and that he goals to pay down U.S. debt.
“If the deficit is not brought under control, America will go bankrupt. This is a very important thing for people to understand. A country is no different from an individual in that if an individual overspends, an individual can go bankrupt. And so can a country and the massive waste, fraud and abuse that has been going on, which is leading to, a $2 trillion a year deficit, that’s, that’s what the president was handed on Jan 20th, a $2 trillion deficit. It’s insane,” Musk mentioned.
The tech government in early January mentioned that he’ll “try for $2 trillion,” including on the time, “I think that’s like the best case outcome.”
