More than 1.3 million devices logged into Elon Musk’s interview with GOP nominee Donald Trump on Monday Night.
Some technical difficulties prevented hundreds of thousands from joining the X Space discussion at its scheduled time of 8 p.m. EST/5 p.m. PST, causing the core of the interview to be 40 minutes late to start.
Once resolved, the 2.5-hour interview touched on election hot button issues. While Musk and Trump found shared viewpoints on issues like immigration, deregulation, and international relations, they also found some points of difference in which Trump seemed to move more toward Elon’s point of view. Most notably, sustainable energy.
The interview comes after the two billionaires publicly denounced each other during Trump’s presidency. In fact, Musk was on advisory councils for Trump, but resigned the position in 2017 after the two disagreed on environmental policy.
Though Trump did not reverse the decisions that led to Musk’s departure, he didn’t publicly disparage Musk. That is in contrast to his general modus operandi toward those who disagree with him — even as Musk publicly, and repeatedly, denounced him.
On the contrary, Trump still tried to associate himself with Musk, citing that Musk had voted for him in 2016 during his 2020 campaign. Overall, Trump seems to have a deep, profound respect for Elon, who he repeatedly compliments and flatters during the interview — as well as in the press.
Perhaps the biggest takeaway from this whole interview is that Trump is an Elon fanboy. That puts Elon in the unique position of being able to change Trump’s mind about things, a power that could become pivotal should Trump win a second term.
Here are some of the topics that were discussed more extensively, and what Musk and Trump had to say about them.
July 13 Rally and Assassination Attempt
In X CEO Elon Musk’s interview with Trump, who fully endorses Trump’s candidacy, they kick off with the July 13 assassination attempt.
“It was a miracle, if I hadn’t turned my head, I would not be talking to you right now…as much as I like you,” Trump tells Elon.
Despite widespread criticisms of the Secret Service’s handling of the event’s security, Trump had kinder words for them.
“When they were on top of me, covering me, actually,” Trump recalls, “very much covering me… and very bravely.”
Trump also commended the Secret Service’s sniper who took out his would-be killer within seconds of the attack.
“He was able to pick it all out within five seconds. And he used one bullet from very far away, I guess, probably about 400 yards….So I have to take my hat off to him, because that’s also surreal…and he’s never had anything like this. And all of a sudden…he has to act,” Trump says.
On Foreign Policy and International Relations
Trump boasted about the rapport he has as authoritarian international state heads, including Vladimir Putin, Kim Jong-Un, the Saudis, and Xi Jingping.
Trump asserts that him having open relationships with these widely-condemned leaders gave him the opportunity to negotiate with them. In Trump’s estimation, this made things safer.
“I had a good relationship with Putin,” Trump says on the topic of the Russian-Ukrainian war. Trump alleges that Ukraine was “the apple of [Putin’s] eye.”
“I told him ‘don’t do it, Vladimir Putin. You cannot do it. It’s going to be a bad day.’ [Putin] said ‘no way.’ ….I said ‘way,'” Trump told Elon before adding. “Putin’s a good negotiator.”
Playing Both Sides
Trump asserts that his presence in the White House prevented Putin from invading. More recently, Trump had a call with Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Reportedly, Zelenskyy reportedly reached out to congratulate Trump on the GOP nomination and check in on him after the July 13 assassination attempt.
Trump later says that if elected, he would “bring peace to the world” and “end the war.” Moreover, Trump referred to Zelenskyy as “an honorable man” — in sharp contrast to his assessment of the Ukrainian leader as the “greatest salesman” less than two months ago. Trump implied the international aide sent to Ukraine was comparable to a very successful fundraising campaign.
Likewise, Trump says having open discourse with North Korean President Kim Jong Un.
“He said that he has a red button on his desk. I said, I have a red button on my desk, too.”
“But my red button is much bigger and my red button works.” Trump says he told Un. Trump was the first U.S. president to ever meet a North Korean leader.
He goes onto to say he maintained a tenuous, quid pro quo-based balance. He claims he was able to leverage these relationships with various leaders to exert influence.
In Trump’s estimation, the icy relations between the U.S. and international leaders seen as threats are in turn, creating alliances between them — without U.S. influence.
“Obama and Biden, and Bush to a certain extent, in all fairness, forced Russia and China together,” Trump says. “…Iran, and they have North Korea….Here we have a modern day axis of evil.”
“And you have to really think about it in the context of global security. That if the American president is someone that like evil dictators are scared of, that makes a huge difference to the security of the world,” Musk says.
On the Economy
“The people want to hear about the economy. Inflation has killed them, they can’t afford groceries. Food prices are up 50, 60, even 100 percent in some cases, Trump says.
He’s not wrong: Inflation and the cot of goods in the top-cited issue influencing voters decisions — and by a lot.
“It doesn’t matter what you make, inflation is eating you alive. [People are] using all their money and borrowing money just to live. It’s a horrible thing that’s happening.”
On that topic, Elon had a lot to say. Musk asserts the government spending is at the heart of inflation.
“We’re currently adding a trillion dollars to deficit about every hundred days,” said Elon adds. “And, you know, the interest payments on the national debt have now exceeded the defense budget. It’s on the order of a trillion dollars.”
“A lot of people are concerned on the economy, a lot of people are concerned about inflation. Inflation is a form of taxation on people who save, people who work. If you solve government spending, you solve inflation,” Musk adds.
“We have to bring energy prices down,” Trump responded.
Trump also points to the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. “I gave the largest tax cuts. For middle income people too, not just businesses,” Trump says.
Trump’s tax cuts did lower the average American’s tax bill significantly.
But the relief was temporary. The part that Trump leaves out however, is while the average Americans’ tax cuts will expire at the end of 2025 — the 14% tax cut given to businesses are permanent.
Related: Trump Presidency Will Reignite Inflation, 16 Nobel-Winning Economists Say
On Government Spending
“Do you think we need think we need to take a look at government spending?” Elon asks.
Elon goes on to propose a Government Efficiency Committee, to ensure “taxpayers’ hard-earned money is well spent,” before adding, “I’d be happy to help out on such a commission.”
Trump seemed receptive to the proposal.
“I’d love that,” Trump says. “You’re the greatest cutter.”
To clarify what Trump means by “greatest cutter,” Trump applauds Elon for firing nearly 80% of Twitter’s employees within six months of his takeover.
“I mean, I look at what you do. You walk in and you just say, you want to quit? They go on strike. I won’t mention the name of the company, but they go on strike and you say, that’s okay. You’re all gone. You’re all gone. So every one of you is gone and you are the greatest. You would be very good. Oh, you would love it.”
On Tuesday, the United Auto Workers files federal charges against both Musk and Trump “for their illegal attempts to threaten and intimidate workers who stand up for themselves by engaging in protected concerted activity, such as strikes.”
On Education
As far as other areas Trump wants to cut federal spending, the Department of Education was firmly in the crosshairs.
“I want to close up the Department of Education, take it back to the states. Not every state will do great,” Trump says.
Trump asserts that California would be one of the states that did poorly because of Governor Gavin Newsom.
“You know, not every state will do great because states that basically aren’t doing good now, you look at Gavin Newsom, the governor of California. He’s terrible. He does a terrible job,” Trump says. “So he’s not going to do great with education.”
California is home to some of the most prestigious schools in the world, including Stanford University, California Institute of Technology, and the top public universities in the world, including UC Berkeley, UC Los Angeles, and UC San Diego.
On Regulation and Deregulation
One area Musk and Elon align on is regulation — or the need for less of it.
“We need sensible regulation,” Musk tells Trump. “There has to be an active process for reducing rules and regulations…we keep adding them, on top of the others…like a hardening of the arteries. We ossify as a society, we can’t make any progress.”
“We did more deregulation…than any other president,” Trump responds. “I remember I had the rule for every one we put in, you have to get rid of at 10 or 12. We did radical cuts on all of that. We had the best economy ever, maybe in the world. Then what happened is COVID came in, and we had to focus on that. Nobody knew what it was,” he recalls.
“Unless there’s a process to clean them up, eventually everything becomes illegal,” Musk adds.
On the FDA
Elon brings up the FDA and how long it takes to get product approved, adding that if Europe approves a product, it should be approved for the U.S. as well. Europe has stricter approval criteria.
“It takes years instead of something that I think could potentially take months that improves people’s lives,” Musk tells Trump. “I just wanted to hop on this point that like there has to be an active process for reducing rules and regulations, because otherwise they just keep building up every year to get like hardening of the arteries.”
“It take 12 years to get a product approved,” Trumps says. “I got it down to 4 years. It just takes too long.
Trump also brings up the 2017 Right to Try Act. He says he faced opposition from the pharmacuetical industry, the medical industry, and the FDA in getting it passed.
“The insurance companies didn’t want it. And the pharmaceutical companies, nobody wanted it. I got everybody into a room and we came up with an agreement that you won’t get sued. And also, they didn’t want it on their record if somebody’s terminally ill and they die after taking a drug. They didn’t want that on their record.”
The Right to Try Act allows late-stage, terminally ill patients who are out of options to electively liability waivers to use non-FDA approved treatments as a Hail Mary attempt.
“If you’re terminally ill, you can use space age medicine or whatever it may be,” Trump says.
All Things Nuclear
One area the Musk and Trump diverge ideologically was climate change. Even more so: What should be done about it.
At times, it seems that they weren’t talking about the same thing.
“The biggest threat isn’t global warming…that the ocean’s will rise 1/8th of an inch…more beachfront property,” Trump says. “It’s nuclear warming….a lot of people don’t understand that.
By “nuclear warming,” Trump is likely referring to a global nuclear arms race. He cites the nuclear warfare capacities of various countries including Russia, China, and North Korea.
Elon brings it back to energy. “Nuclear is actually way, better. It’s underrated as a power source.”
“But people talk about global warming…but we need to worry about nuclear warming,” Trump says. “To me, the biggest problem is not climate change. To me, the biggest problem is nuclear power.”
Trump seems to conflate nuclear as an energy source with a nuclear arms race. Elon brings the conversation back to nuclear power — not nuclear weapons.
“It’s underrated as an electricity source,” Musk says. “And I think it’s something that’s worth reconsidering. But there’s so much regulation that people can’t get it done.”
Trump offers a left field, but not entirely off base suggestion.
“Maybe they need to change the name — the name is the rough name. Maybe we’ll rebrand it. It has a branding problem,” Trump says.
Trump goes onto illustrate the association people have with nuclear energy: Major nuclear catastrophes, such as Chernobyl and Fukushima.
“When you see what happened in Japan, where they say you won’t be able to go on the land for about 3000 years, did you ever see that?” Trump asks Musk. “And in Russia, where they had the problem with a, you know, there’s a lot of bad things happened and they have a problem. And they say that in 2000 years, people will start to occupy the land again.”
A Divergence of Views
When it came to other energy sources, Trump contradicts his recent past comments on the topic, seeming more receptive — perhaps because of who he was speaking to. Trump tells Elon he is waiting on him to crack solar technology.
“But, you know, I’m sort of waiting for you to come up with solar panels on the roofs of your cars and on the trunks of the cars. And it just seems like something that at some point you will come up with,” Trump says. “I’m sure you’ll be the first.”
That being said, Trump’s potential second term is unlikely to see a shift of attitude of renewable sources. Among the topics he came back to repeatedly was drilling domestic oils sources, which he calls “liquid gold.” He also criticizes Biden for scrapping the Keystone XL pipeline plans that he approved immediately after taking office.
Trump also bowed out of the Paris Accords, and international treaty to take action on climate change, during his presidency. Other populist leaders followed his lead.
The Pairs Accord exit prompted Musk leave his advisory position in the Trump Cabinet in 2017.
On Energy
Elon, a leader in the world of renewable energy source, shows a more fossil fuel friendly stance than expected — but not entirely.
“I should probably share my views on climate change, and oil and gas…they probably aren’t what people think,” Elon says. “I don’t think it’s right to vilify the oil and gas industry. It’s probably better if the U.S. provides instead of other countries,” Musk adds.
Still, he emphasizes the need to transition to sustainable energy while there’s still time.
“And at the same time, obviously, my view is, is like, we do over time want to move to a sustainable energy economy. Eventually…you run out of oil and gas,” Musk says.
On Climate Change
Musk appears to believe in climate change, in contrast to Trump who has repeatedly called climate change a “hoax.” Musk tells Trump that carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere can make life uncomfortable.
“If you start going passed 1000 parts per million [carbon dioxide concentration levels in the atmosphere], it actually gets hard to breath. You get headaches, nausea,” Musk tells Trump. “We’re at about 400 ppm now, adding about 2 ppm per year, so we have a long ways to go.”
Musk thinks there’s still a comfortable window of time to do so.
“We don’t want to get too close to 1000 ppm. On balance, it’s probably better to move faster [toward transitioning to sustainable and renewable energy sources] than slower. Just lean in the direction of sustainability. I actually think solar will be the major source of energy in the future. That’s what Tesla is trying to move things towards,” Musk adds.
In contrast to many of his earlier statements on renewable energy, Trump actually somewhat concedes to Elon on this point.
“A solar panel on the roof, you know, on flat surfaces, on certain surfaces might be good,” Trump says. “At least in certain areas of the country where you have the or the world where you have [a lot of] sun.”
On Public Transportation
Musk goes on to suggest investment in infrastructure of public transit. Smartly, Musk appeals to Trump’s ego and competitive nature to be “the best.”
“You could have high speed tunnels that are actually better than than anything else in the world for high speed transport between cities,” Musk says. “And that would be something that, you know, Americans could say, wow, OK, we’ve got something that’s cooler than anyone else in the world. That’s that’s kind of thing that makes you proud.”
It works. Trump agrees with Elon – even marvels at how far behind the U.S. is in public transportation relative to the rest of the world.
“Much safer than surface trains where there is a danger there, you know, with people with crazy people. It’s much safer, much better,” he says.
The ‘safer’ comment is particularly interesting.
In 2018, Trump rolled back regulations on trains carrying hazardous materials, an action that caught attention after the 2023 East Palestine train derailment caused a firebomb and toxic chemicals to pour into waterways in East Palestine, Ohio.
A subsequent investigation revealed that it it was unlikely the regulation Trump nixed would have made a difference in that particular case. A report by the National Transportation Safety Board says the derailment happened due to a faulty, overheated wheel – not due to the types of brakes the train had, which the cancelled rule applied to.
“You know, it’s sad because I’ve seen some of the greatest trains. I find it fascinating,” Trump ponders. “I’ve seen the systems and how they work and the bullet trains, they call them,…they go unbelievably fast, unbelievably comfortable with no problems. And we don’t have anything like that in this country, not even close. And it doesn’t make sense that we don’t — doesn’t make sense.”
Big Numbers
If there’s one reoccurring theme in Trump’s speeches lately, it’s crowd size.
Trump always likes to take notes of crowd numbers. He marveled at the real time data on viewership on the X Space.
“You got like 60 million people listening,” Trump says. “Do I get paid for this or not?”
(At the time that Trump says this, there were 1.1 million active logins to the discussion. However, the post in which the link was shared had 62.4M views.)
Elon Endorses Trump Wholeheartedly
“I haven’t been very political…they try to paint me as a far right guy, which is absurd. I make electric cars and solar panels…I stood in line for 6 hours to shake Obama’s hand,” Musk says. “You are the path the prosperity. Kamala isn’t.”
“I always thought of you as somewhat left,” Trump adds. “It makes your endorsement and even greater honor.”
“I want to congratulate you, you’ve done a great job. You’ve got a fertile mind,” Trump tells Elon. “Not all endorsements mean that much…but yours meant a lot to me.”
Related: Billionaires Endorse Trump After Assassination Attempt
