If you saw it in a movie, you’d probably think it was implausible to a cartoonish degree: An unelected billionaire, after effectively purchasing influence, attaches himself to an American political leader and starts sitting in on meetings with foreign leaders, huddling with members of Congress, helping kill legislation for reasons that don’t make sense, weighing in on cabinet choices, and heading up a powerless advisory panel that the political world is pretending has real authority.
All the while, leading public officials — who were actually elected to positions of authority — coordinate their policymaking efforts with this billionaire as if he were in a position of real influence.
But this isn’t the basis for an overwrought Hollywood script; it’s American politics as 2024 comes to an end. There’s reason to believe, however, that the public isn’t overly impressed. A HuffPost report highlighted the latest public opinion research related to Elon Musk and his affiliation with Donald Trump:
Musk’s role in the still-nascent Trump administration is at least somewhat controversial among the public: A YouGov poll found 48% of Americans had a favorable opinion of Musk, while 42% had an unfavorable opinion. The Associated Press found the public generally split in their opinions of Musk, while a Quinnipiac University poll released Wednesday found a 53% majority of the public disapproves of Musk playing a prominent role in the Trump administration.
The Quinnipiac poll was of particular interest because of the straightforward wording of the question: “Do you approve or disapprove of Elon Musk playing a prominent role in the Trump administration?”
There was, predictably, a sharp partisan divide, but overall, a 53% majority said they disapprove. (Among self-identified independent voters, the gap was 20 points: 57% disapproved, while 37% approved.)
The same national survey found that a 44% plurality have an unfavorable opinion of the billionaire, but that only helped reinforce the larger point: The real public reservations are not about Musk personally, but rather about his outsized role in the incoming Republican administration. (The Quinnipiac poll surveyed 924 self-identified registered voters nationwide from Dec. 12-16 and has a margin of error of +/- 3.2 percentage points.)
At least for now, however, these public attitudes are being ignored: Ahead of this week’s government shutdown deadline, House Speaker Mike Johnson has, by his own admission, been in frequent communication with Musk, trying to convince him of the merits of a stopgap spending bill as if the billionaire had a vote on Capitol Hill.
Those efforts have not succeeded, but what matters is the fact that the Republican Party’s top official on Capitol Hill felt the need to appeal to an unelected billionaire for support. The Louisiana congressman isn’t alone: Other GOP lawmakers are also reaching out to Musk in the hopes of advancing their legislative priorities, too. Democratic officials, meanwhile, have begun referring to the world’s wealthiest individual as “President Elon Musk“ and the nation’s “Shadow President,” and it’s tough to blame them under the circumstances. Of course, Trump has a history of resenting those who try to share his spotlight, and it’s not yet clear whether the president-elect will tolerate his billionaire pal generating so much attention that he wants for himself.
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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