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A pretty fundamental rule of political physics in our age: If you criticize Donald Trump, he roars back.
Which makes what’s happening now worth noting: Elon Musk is criticizing Donald Trump, and Trump … isn’t responding.
As you likely know by now, on Monday afternoon, Musk used his X account to complain about the Republican budget bill — the one that’s supposed to be Trump’s signature legislation, and the one that’s literally called the “One Big Beautiful Bill” act because that’s the name Trump likes.
More specifically: Musk called the bill “a disgusting abomination.”
“Shame on those who voted for it: you know you did wrong. You know it,” he added.
That story — the richest man in the world, and for at least several months, a key Trump ally, blasting a Trump project in public — dominated Monday’s news cycle. Even Fox News had to cover it.
And under normal circumstances, Trump would rage back. Not this time, though.
Trump has yet to acknowledge Musk’s broadside out loud, or on his Truth Social platform.
When a Fox News reporter asked White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt “how mad” Trump would be when he learned about Musk’s comments, she had a restrained answer ready: “The president already knows where Elon Musk stood on this bill. It doesn’t change the president’s opinion. This is one big, beautiful bill, and he’s sticking to it.”
And when I asked the White House press office for comment Wednesday morning, they referred me to Leavitt’s previous statement.
Obvious conclusion: For now, at least, the Trump team is going out of its way not to stoke a feud with Musk.
It seems very unlikely that Trump’s silence is going to be permanent: Trump loves holding forth in front of the press, so someone’s going to ask him about it at some point.
Still, this level of what seems to be restraint is remarkable for a man who doesn’t usually restrain himself, and who loathes people who poke at him in public. What’s happening?
For starters, it’s worth noting that Trump has already gone through a version of this. Last week, Musk used much more muted language to criticize the same bill in a CBS interview, and those comments also became a news story. And Trump didn’t fire back at Musk then, either — even when asked about it at a press conference.
It’s also worth noting that even though Musk used scathing language to condemn the bill on Monday, he never once criticized Trump directly.
That gives both men rhetorical wiggle room: Musk can argue that his problems with the bill have nothing to do with the man who’s promoting it. And Trump can lump in Musk’s critique along with everyone else who has problems with the bill, including some Republicans like Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene.
But it’s also likely that the most likely thing is the most likely thing: That Donald Trump has enormous admiration for Elon Musk, and treats him differently than just about anyone else in the world. And that even though Musk has officially left his role as a part-time White House advisor, Trump still wants him on his side.
For now.
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