Hope Nothing Happens to Elon Musk, Because Then Donald Trump Would Be President
President-Elect Trump wants the Senate to defer to him on appointments, and the House to defer to him on legislation. He in turn hands the keys over to Elon Musk. Is this a democratic republic?
Elon Musk is in theory the world’s richest person. I say “in theory,” because until he liquidates all his shares in Tesla, SpaceX and X, it’s mostly on paper, and what matters is the value of the shares the day they are sold, reduced by what he might owe. But no doubt Elon Musk is incredibly rich and because of this, very powerful.
Donald Trump is the President-Elect of the United States. He lives the lifestyle of the rich and famous, but his actual worth is the subject of great debate, with one unifying principle shared by all: whatever Trump may actually be worth, he is greatly exaggerating the truth. He’s almost certainly not a legitimate billionaire, and his net worth is most likely in the red. Unlike Musk, a brilliant entrepreneur and businessman, Trump has no business sense at all, has gone bankrupt five times, including with casinos in Atlantic City.
No one voted for Elon Musk, and he has no government experience. He is accountable to no one except Trump. He’s a right wing extremist to boot, linked to neo-Nazis and neo-Nazi political parties, among other unsavory extremists. Trump is the moderate in Musk’s circles.
So how the hell did he wind up being in charge of running the incoming Trump Presidency? Right now, he’s trying to bully the GOP Congress to do his bidding, and threatening primaries against those who resist.
Elon Musk spent a total over $100 million helping to elect Donald Trump. In return, Trump has pretty much turned the duties of the President-to-be over to his benefactor.
It comes as no surprise that Trump sees the separation of powers as illusory and advisory only. In Trump’s eyes, which have never laid eyes on the Constitution, all power devolves from the President. Therefore, the Constitutional obligation of the Senate to proffer “advice and consent” on high ranking federal appointments, does not really mean what it says, nor does the Constitutional mandate that all “bills for raising Revenue” (that means tax and budget bills) originate in the House.
In Trump’s view, the Senate and House exist solely to carry out his own visions and wishes. There should be no vetting or discussion on his nominees, no debate or compromise on the “revenue” bills. His regent, Elon Musk, tells the legislature to jump, and expects Senate Majority Leader John Thune and Speaker MAGA Mike Johnson to ask “how high?”
It hasn’t worked out that way, as the Republican Senate chased away AG nominee and pervert Matt Gaetz, and is on the cusp of denying approval to Defense nominee Pete Hegseth, Director of National Security nominee Tulsi Gabbard, HHS Secretary nominee RFK, Jr. and highly likely the same fate awaits FBI Director nominee Kash Patel. Secretary of State nominee Marco Rubio should have no trouble gaining swift and near-unanimous approval from his colleagues, and this will mean he is gone from the Senate; allowing only three defections for each of these troubled and troubling nominees.
Trump’s view of the Presidency goes beyond even the “solitary executive” theory, which holds that all power emanates from the President, and as the real head of any department, can order any federal officer to do whatever the executive wishes. This view was incorporated into John Robert’s disgraceful grant of immunity to the only President who ever needed it, Donald J. Trump. (Let’s not forget that Donald Trump remains a convicted felon; New York State Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan has denied Trump’s motion to dismiss under the Roberts gift, because the acts for which Trump was convicted predate his term as an immunized President.)
Trump believes that the other two branches of government are not his co-equals, and he rejects the notion of checks and balances. He’s authoritarian all the way.
Since Trump believes all federal power belongs to him, it is natural that he’d feel free to delegate it. Even though he hasn’t yet been inaugurated for his second term, the combination of a comeback victory and the near disappearance of the incumbent President have allowed him to operate as if he were already in office. His style is to bully the Senate and House to do his bidding, through Mr. Musk, even though it’s not working all that well so far. One reason why the Trump magic seems to be ebbing-just yesterday, 38 far right members of the GOP House caucus voted against the revenue bill Trump demanded pass- is precisely because Trump has delegated his political and personal powers to Elon Musk.
Elon Musk is richer than Trump, that’s for sure, and he used his money to throw the financially struggling ex-President a financial lifeline while he was running to be reelected. Musk also enjoys enormous wealth from federal contracts, and he’s being investigated by several federal agencies for possible improprieties, misrepresentations, and regulatory violations. It’s in his business interests to have leverage over the President.
Trump has allowed Musk to deliver his political and economic messages to Congress, including threats to primary those Republicans who don’t do s Trump demands. That has worked well in the past against more moderate Republicans, who either cave, retire, or lose primaries, but it may be different in the case of a far right winger who will claim they are being truest to Trumpian philosophy.
There are a few problems with Trump delegating his authority to Musk. The first is obvious: the Republicans in the Senate and House don’t have to listen to Musk, because he has no real political power aside from what he gets through Trump. They also know that everything Trump touches dies, that he throws his most loyal people under buses, and there’s no reason to think Elon Musk will be around all that much longer as a member of Trump’s inner circle.
Another obstacle facing the Trump-to-Musk handoff is that Trump and Musk hold radically different views on economics and American society. True, both are racists, misogynists and immigrant bashers, both traffic in antisemitism, and both are enamored of fascistic strongmen like Putin, Orban and Milei of Argentina. (They may not know the Argentinian loves Jews and plans to convert when he out of office.) Trump is an economic populist, who was elected on promises to bring down inflation, create more good manufacturing jobs, protect Social Security and Medicare, and his Secretary of Labor nominee is that rarest of Republicans, a pro-union Republican.
Elon Musk is somewhere between a libertarian and a fascist. He hates unions, and couldn’t care less about keeping high-paying jobs in America unless it benefits his companies. He’s libertarian in that he wants no government interference with his business, not in any way, no to protect workers, the public, or investors. On the other and, he wants government contacts, subsidies and tax breaks. Unlike Trump, who promises us quick relief, Musk warns us of great pain we-but not he-must endure to make things right. He wants to cut the federal budget of anything that helps the citizens, and holds a special hatred of Social Security and Medicare, which he does not believe should exist.
Politically, Musk embraces far right racists and Jew hate, and has just announced his support for the AfD, a thinly-veiled neo-Nazi party that regularly skates the German laws against Nazism; he also declared his love for Reform UK, a xenophobic and racist party. We’ve seen how he turned Twitter into X and then a home for Alex Jones, Q-Anon, racists and antisemitic crackpot theorists who spread lies and hate.
While Musk may be rich and even brilliant, he’s not particularly impressive, charismatic, or as compelling a figure as is say, Donald J. Trump. Even though he may well be the richest person who ever lived, being threatened with a Republican primary by Elon Musk is not as chilling as when the threat comes directly from Trump. That goes a long way towards explaining why Musk isn’t able to get the ball over the finish line on anything.
Right now, it is Elon Musk who is directing the incoming administration’s economic and legislative priorities. He’s making a terrible hash of it all, driving us to the brink of a government shutdown, breaching Republican unity before Trump is sworn in, and almost certainly assuring more moves to boot MAGA Mike with an even more extreme Speaker, which will cause the same paralysis we saw last January when it took days to choose Kevin McCarthy, who was tossed out eight months later.
I despise Donald Trump and disagree with him on just about everything. However, he was the person the American people elected to lead the government, not Elon Musk, who could not be President for the simple reason that he was born and raised in South Africa, and is thus Constitutionally ineligible. Musk is trying to buy an office he cannot legally attain. He did so by financing Trump’s campaign, helping with the inauguration, giving him free publicity on X, and bullying anyone he can to impose his-not Trump’s-ideas on an unwilling Congress. There is an inevitable conflict coming between Trump’s right wing but populist politics, and Musk’s libertarian, Ayn Rand style laissez faire economics. Whatever I think of Trump, he’s the one that got elected, not Musk.
We have to wonder why Trump wanted to be President if he planned to delegate the job to Musk.
Maybe he just wanted to stay out of jail, and Musk’s money helped him achieve that goal?
THE TRUTH WILL WIN IF IT IS TOLD!
Stephen Shaiken is an attorney and author. He has written extensively on Constitutional issues. He has litigated scores of Constitutional questions in federal appellate courts and is a member of the United States Supreme Court Bar.
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