Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent publicly trashed Elon Musk just one day after the billionaire tech boss announced he’s creating his own political party.
“Most of America thinks he’s a loser,” Scott said on live TV, responding to questions about Elon’s informal launch of the America Party, which was filed with the Federal Election Commission on Saturday.
Scott said Elon simply isn’t well-liked enough to pull off a political movement and should instead focus on running his companies.
Elon, who leads Tesla and SpaceX, has been pushing the idea of a third party on X for around two weeks and has decided to go ahead with it after breaking ranks with President Trump and Republicans over the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.
Trump signed the bill into law Friday. Elon, furious over its long-term financial costs, said it undermines all the work done by his now-defunct Department of Government Efficiency project (DOGE).
Bessent tells Elon to stop embarrassing himself
“Elon was never popular in the polls,” Scott said. He praised the policy goals of DOGE but said Elon himself doesn’t have national support. Though this tension between the two men isn’t anything new.
Elon quit his special government role in May after clashing with Trump. And while Scott kept it diplomatic at first, this latest interview shows the gloves are off.
The Treasury Secretary told CNN he believes the board members at Elon’s companies “wanted him to come back and run those companies,” implying they weren’t happy about his political adventures. “They will be encouraging him to focus on his business activities, not his political activities,” Scott said.
Elon’s beef with Trump centers on the deficit projections of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which is expected to blow a $3.9 trillion hole in the national debt over the next decade. The estimate came from the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.
Elon posted that the bill “makes a mockery” of everything his DOGE team built while inside the government. He also said DOGE had become a “whipping boy for everything.”
After Trump won the election, Elon lobbied hard for his buddy Howard Lutnick, the former Cantor Fitzgerald CEO, to become Treasury Secretary.
Trump chose Scott instead and gave Howard the Department of Commerce post. Elon, as always, had a public meltdown over that, though he made sure to keep it strictly about Scott, not Trump.
Shouting match, body-check, and threats of deportation
In April, things got physical. After a tense meeting with Trump, Elon allegedly body-checked Scott, according to Steve Bannon, a MAGA-aligned podcaster. Scott hasn’t confirmed the incident, but he hasn’t denied it either. Weeks later, on the Pod Force One podcast, Scott compared himself to a “ninja” and said Elon “fancies himself more of a Viking.”
Trump hasn’t fully turned on Elon yet, but he hasn’t stayed silent either. The president has publicly floated the idea of cutting federal subsidies to Elon’s companies and once said he might explore the option of deporting him. Elon, originally from South Africa, is now a US citizen.
Republicans think Elon’s opposition to the megabill may have more to do with the removal of Biden-era green energy subsidies, something that hit Tesla hard. Elon denies that’s the reason, saying his main concern is the massive spike in federal debt.
The America Party, which Elon says will focus “extremely concentrated force at a precise location on the battlefield,” is expected to target just a few tight House and Senate races. His explanation referenced a Greek military strategy used by Epaminondas at the Battle of Leuctra. Elon hasn’t named any candidates or races yet but confirmed his team has officially filed to make the party real.
He claimed the plan is to break the “uniparty system,” referring to both Democrats and Republicans. His followers on X had voted in favor of the idea during a poll Elon ran before making the announcement public.
Elon hasn’t said whether he’ll run for office himself, but he’s made it clear he wants to change the balance of power in Congress. For now, the billionaire seems to be focused on finding pressure points rather than building a full national coalition.
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