Elon Musk is now claiming he is the reason President Donald Trump won the 2024 election.
Musk, who had a falling out with the president in recent weeks that recently erupted into an all-out civil war, raged Thursday about Trump’s “ingratitude” for the $288 million he spent to propel him back into the Oval Office.
“Without me, Trump would have lost the election,” Musk wrote. “Dems would control the House, and the Republicans would be 51-49 in the Senate.”
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He added in a follow-up post, “Such ingratitude.”
Musk’s posts came in response to Trump saying he “would have won Pennsylvania regardless of Elon” and that he was “very disappointed with Elon” over his opposition to his “Big Beautiful Bill.”
Musk, 53, was Trump’s right-hand man in the early days of MAGA 2.0. He was a frequent presence at the Oval Office, held joint press conferences with Trump along with his toddler son X, and took on a starring role at Cabinet meetings.
It appears their relationship started to falter in May, around the time Musk said he was stepping back from his work at the Department of Government Efficiency and that he would not spend in such abundance on politics moving forward.
There has been endless speculation about what led to the high-stakes divorce, but White House insiders told Axios that Musk was “b--thurt” that Trump’s beloved mega bill slashed, among other things, the government’s electric vehicle tax credit.
Trump alluded to that being one reason on Thursday.
“Elon is upset because we took the EV mandate,” Trump said Thursday. “I know that disturbed him.”
Musk responded on X shortly after, claiming he never saw the bill in advance.
“Whatever,” Musk wrote. “Keep the EV/solar incentive cuts in the bill, even though no oil & gas subsidies are touched (very unfair!!), but ditch the MOUNTAIN of DISGUSTING PORK in the bill.”
Musk has steadily grown more critical in his posts of Trump and his MAGA allies this week, beginning Tuesday, when he called Trump’s Big Beautiful Bill “outrageous,” “pork-filled,” and a “disgusting abomination.”
On Thursday afternoon, he reshared a clip from their joint Tesla stunt in March, where Trump told reporters that Musk was a “great patriot” who “has never asked me for a thing.”
“Remember this?” Musk wrote, tagging Trump’s account.
He then took things a step further, writing of Trump’s old remarks in favor of balancing the budget, “Where is the man who wrote these words? Was he replaced by a body double!?”
Musk initially refrained from criticizing Trump directly. However, he took the gloves off Thursday and began quote-tweeting old posts by the president in which he had called for balancing the federal budget—something Musk said his “Big Beautiful Bill” fails to do.
Trump confirmed Thursday that his close relationship with Musk is likely over.
“Look, Elon and I had a great relationship,” Trump said. “I don’t know if we will anymore.”
Trump’s first White House tenure was marked by high turnover, which saw close allies become foes overnight (just ask former Vice President Mike Pence). The president addressed that turnover again on Thursday, suggesting that Musk is just the latest to be upset that he was pushed out by his administration.
“People leave my administration, and they love us, and then at some point… some of them actually become hostile,” Trump said. “I don’t know what it is. It’s sort of Trump derangement syndrome, I guess they call it.”
He continued, “They leave it, and the glamour is gone, and the whole world is different, and they become hostile. I don’t know what it is.”
