As Donald Trump’s relationship with Elon Musk imploded last week, the president and his top campaign donor didn’t just throw random rhetorical punches. Their feud included rather specific threats.
In fact, on Thursday afternoon, in the midst of an online volley, Trump wrote, “The easiest way to save money in our Budget, Billions and Billions of Dollars, is to terminate Elon’s Governmental Subsidies and Contracts.”
At least so far, there’s been no White House follow-through on this, and for the most part, the intensity of the conflict appears to have subsided. But it was against this backdrop that the president spoke to “Meet the Press” host Kristen Welker by phone over the weekend and added a fresh threat to the conversation. NBC News reported:
President Donald Trump on Saturday said there would be “serious consequences” if tech mogul Elon Musk funds Democratic candidates to run against Republicans who vote in favor of the GOP’s sweeping budget bill.
When Welker asked, “Are you concerned that Elon Musk could start funding Democratic candidates?” the president responded, “If he does, he’ll have to pay the consequences for that.” Pressed for details as to what that might entail, the Republican added, “I’m not going to say, but he’ll have to pay very serious consequences if he does that.”
As a practical matter, it was easy to understand why Trump might be concerned about this. Last fall, Musk was the Republican Party’s most important megadonor. Indeed, The Washington Post reported earlier this year that, based on the final available tally, the billionaire spent at least $288 million to help elect Trump and other Republican candidates in the 2024 cycle.
It stands to reason that the party would welcome similar investments in the 2026 midterm elections, though last week, while complaining about the GOP’s domestic policy megabill — the inaptly named “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” — Musk wrote, “In November next year, we fire all politicians who betrayed the American people.”
This led to a related social media item in which Musk added, “A new political party is needed in America to represent the 80% in the middle! … This is Fate.”
While there’s obviously all kinds of time between now and Election Day 2026, this did not sound like a billionaire ready to write generous checks to his erstwhile Republican allies. But there’s a more important dimension to all of this: Politicians, at least in this in country, do not generally warn private citizens — out loud, in public, on the record — that they’ll be punished for contributing to a different party. In fact, I honestly can’t think of a comparable example to this. Trump is a sitting president, effectively telling his top campaign donor that he’s prepared to use the power of his office to impose “very serious consequences” on his former ally if Musk dares to support candidates the Republican doesn’t like. Under normal circumstances, and in a healthy political environment, a threat like this one would itself constitute a significant political controversy.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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