Elon Musk suggested President Donald Trump should be impeached and replaced with 40-year-old Vice President J.D. Vance amid their fiery falling out.
It came after X user Ian Miles Cheong wrote: “President vs Elon. Who wins? My money’s on Elon. Trump should be impeached and JD Vance should replace him.”
“Yes,” Musk responded.
He also predicted that Trump’s tariff policy would create economic turmoil.
“The Trump tariffs will cause a recession in the second half of this year,” Musk said.
The impeachment call comes after Musk made the eye-popping claim that the president is “in the Epstein files.”
He also threatened to decommission the space ships that are taking NASA astronauts and supplies to the International Space Station.
That came after Trump threatened to cancel all of Musk’s government contracts and said he had pushed the billionaire DOGE leader out, and that the SpaceX CEO had gone ‘CRAZY!’
One of Trump’s oldest advisers, Steve Bannon, went even further and suggested the South African-born Musk should be deported.
“They should initiate a formal investigation of his immigration status because I am of the strong belief that he is an illegal alien, and he should be deported from the country immediately,” Bannon said in a phone interview Thursday with The New York Times.
Later on his War Room show, Bannon – who has long openly criticized the billionaire – called Musk an ‘unstable individual’ and a ‘national security issue,’ pointing to report that charted the DOGE leader’s drug use.
‘President Trump is a bull and Elon is a baby calf,’ Bannon also said.
The spectacular fallout between Trump and Musk – who were political allies for a little less than a year – started in recent weeks when the billionaire started resisting Republicans’ ‘big, beautiful bill,’ arguing that the spending wiped out DOGE’s cost-cutting efforts.
Then, on Thursday, when Trump was supposed to be hosting the new German Chancellor Friedrich Merz in the Oval Office he was asked about Musk’s recent criticism.
From there the dam broke.
“Elon and I had a great relationship. I don’t know if we will any more, I was surprised,” Trump told reporters.
The president suggested that Musk was angry – not over the bill ballooning the deficit – but because the Trump administration has pulled back on electric vehicle mandates, which negatively impacted Tesla, and replaced the Musk-approved nominee to lead NASA, which could hinder SpaceX’s government contracts.
“And you know, Elon’s upset because we took the EV mandate, which was a lot of money for electric vehicles, and they’re having a hard time the electric vehicles and they want us to pay billions of dollars in subsidy,” Trump said. “I know that disburbed him.”
Over the weekend, Trump pulled the nomination of Jared Isaacman to lead NASA.
Isaacman had worked alongside Musk at SpaceX.
“He recommended somebody that I guess he knew very well, I’m sure he respected him, to run NASA and I didn’t think it was appropriate and he happened to be a Democrat, like totally Democrat,” Trump continued. “We won, we get certain privileges and one of the privileges is we don’t have to appoint a Democrat.”
Musk posted to X as Trump’s Q&A with reporters was ongoing. “Whatever,” the billionaire 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,” he advised.
“In the entire history of civilization, there has never been legislation that [is] both big and beautiful. Everyone knows this!’ Musk continued. ‘Either you get a big and ugly bill or a slim and beautiful bill. Slim and beautiful is the way.'”
The spat quickly turned personal with Musk then posting that Trump would have lost the 2024 election had it not been for the world’s richest man – him.
Musk had publicly endorsed Trump on the heels of the July 13th assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania and poured around $290 million of his fortune into the Republican’s campaign.
The billionaire also joined Trump on the campaign trail when he returned to the site of the Butler shooting in early October, a month before Election Day.
Trump said in the Oval that he likely still would have won Pennsylvania without Musk’s help and because Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris didn’t choose the state’s governor, Josh Shapiro, to be her running mate.
Even with Shapiro on the ticket, Trump claimed, “I would have won Pennsylvania, I would have won by a lot.”
Musk said that was laughable.
“Without me, Trump would have lost the election, Dems would control the House and the Republicans would be 51-49 in the Senate,'” Musk claimed.
“‘Such ingratitude,” the billionaire added.
The 53-year-old Musk also asserted he had more staying power than the 78-year-old president.
“Oh and some food for thought as they ponder this question: Trump has 3.5 years left as President, but I will be around for 40+ years,” Musk said Thursday afternoon, responding to a post from MAGA agitator Laura Loomer.
Loomer said she was reporting from Capitol Hill and that Republican lawmakers were trying to determine if it was better to side with Trump or Musk.
After his meeting with Merz, Trump continued to throw punches online.
Trump asserted that he had asked Musk to leave his administration and said the billionaire went ‘CRAZY!’
Elon was “wearing thin,” I asked him to leave, I took away his EV Mandate that forced everyone to buy Electric Cars that nobody else wanted (that he knew for months I was going to do!), and he just went CRAZY!’ Trump wrote.
The president then threatened to pull SpaceX and Tesla’s government contracts.
“The easiest way to save money in our Budget, Billions and Billions of Dollars, is to terminate Elon’s Governmental Subsidies and Contracts. I was always surprised that Biden didn’t do it!” Trump wrote.
“This just gets better and better,’ he wrote. ‘Go ahead, make my day…’
In a follow-up post, Musk said he would “begin decommissioning its Dragon spacecraft immediately.”
The Dragon is how NASA astronauts currently travel to the International Space Station – and how supplies make it there.
As the fight continued, Tesla shares plummeted.
Anti-semitic rapper Kanye West even got involved.
“Broooos please noooooo. We love you both so much,” West wrote.
And Musk threw the Epstein bomb.
‘@RealDonaldTrump is in the Epstein files. That is the real reason they have not been made public,’ Musk wrote. ‘Have a nice day, DJT!’
Jeffrey Epstein is a serial child sex offender who died in prison in 2019.
Trump pledged to release the files related to Epstein, with Attorney General Pam Bondi releasing some pages in February, but most of that information was already in the public domain.
“‘Mark this post for the future. The truth will come out,” Musk added.
The White House did not immediately respond to the Daily Mail’s request for comment.
Trump didn’t directly respond to Musk’s Epstein charge, instead posting what amounted to a shrug on Truth Social, while also continuing to back the ‘big, beautiful bill.’
‘I don’t mind Elon turning against me, but he should have done so months ago,’ Trump wrote. ‘This is one of the Greatest Bills ever presented to Congress.’
Later he ignored shouted questions from reporters on Musk’s Epstein charge as he hosted the National Fraternal Order of Police executive board in the State Dining Room.
Asked for comment, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement: “This is an unfortunate episode from Elon, who is unhappy with the One Big Beautiful Bill because it does not include the policies he wanted.”
The President is focused on passing this historic piece of legislation and making our country great again,’ Leavitt added.
Trump didn’t directly respond to Musk’s Epstein charge, instead posting what amounted to a shrug on Truth Social, while also continuing to back the “big, beautiful bill.'”
“I don’t mind Elon turning against me, but he should have done so months ago,’ Trump wrote. ‘This is one of the Greatest Bills ever presented to Congress.”
Later he ignored shouted questions from reporters on Musk’s Epstein charge as he hosted the National Fraternal Order of Police executive board in the State Dining Room.
A source familiar pointed out that “everyone knows President Trump kicked Jeffrey Epstein out of his Palm Beach Golf Club.”
“The Administration itself released Epstein files with the President’s name included. This is not a new surprise Elon is uncovering. Everyone already knew this,” the source continued.
The source also mused, ‘If Elon truly thought the President was more deeply involved with Epstein, why did he hangout with him for 6 months and say he “loves him as much as a straight man can love a straight man?”‘
It was less than a week ago that Trump gave Musk a golden key and a DOGE send-off from the Oval Office.
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