Trump and Musk talked for more than two hours on X about national security, energy policy, immigration, and other topics, in a freewheeling conversation that provided the former president with a much-anticipated platform to launch personal attacks on his political opponents while both men revelled in their broadly shared vision for the country.
The chat on the social media platform’s live-streaming tool Spaces, which was delayed due to technical issues, began with Musk inquiring about Trump’s assassination attempt at a rally in Pennsylvania last month. Musk refers to security flaws that allowed the shooter to go onto a nearby roof. “That does seem crazy,” he replied.
“Well, they’re going to learn from this,” Trump remarked, applauding the Secret Service response. “They moved so fast and let me tell you, that took tremendous courage.”
Trump is in a tight battle with Democratic contender Vice President Kamala Harris, who has gained ground since President Biden resigned from the presidential contest.
The Republican former president has been frustrated by the attention Harris has received, and he saw his return to X—formerly known as Twitter—as a means to reclaim some of the focus. Trump has 88.9 million followers on X as of Monday night, compared to 7.53 million on his own Truth Social network.
Trump’s team billed it as “the interview of the century,” but the audio-only event sounded more like listening in on a phone call, frequently with rambling, between two individuals who have grown closer as Musk’s politics have gone to the right. Musk, who endorsed Trump immediately following the murder attempt, had stated prior to the event that he did not want to conduct a standard interview and instead that the topic be conversational.
There were few revelations about Trump’s second-term strategy, and Musk struggled to get his message over. Internet entrepreneurs have taken a more nuanced approach to problems such as immigration than Trump has. Trump was primarily in attack mode.
Musk stated that most immigrants who enter the country “are actually good hardworking people,” but others are not. Trump was highly harsh, claiming that criminals and “nonproductive” individuals were invading the country.
“These are rough people,” Trump stated. “These are people we don’t want in our country.”
Trump incorrectly stated that “over 20 million people” entered the United States after fleeing jails, mental hospitals, or crazy asylums.
He stated that undocumented migrants are entering the United States at “levels never seen before.” According to The Wall Street Journal, the country recorded approximately 57,000 illegal crossings in July, down from over 250,000 in December, when they set an all-time high.
“I’d love it,” Trump replied.
In May, the Journal claimed that Trump and Musk had discussed Musk’s potential advising role if Trump won a second term.
The former president, whose campaign has been attempting to define Harris, labeled her phony. But he also spent time criticizing Biden, sometimes concentrating on his old opponent’s record and labeling him stupid. Biden withdrew from the campaign three weeks ago, but Trump is attempting to tie his new competitor to the administration’s policies.
“By the way, do you believe Biden could do this interview? Do you believe Kamala could do this interview?”Trump said.
A Harris representative said: “Trump’s entire campaign is in service of people like Elon Musk and himself—self-obsessed affluent men who will sell out the middle class and who cannot run a livestream in the year 2024.”
When the conversation shifted to the utilization of fossil fuels, Trump claimed that the issue was distant in the future. “I think we have, you know, perhaps hundreds of years left,” he said afterwards.
Musk softly pushed back. “My estimate would be, you know, a little more aggressive than that,” he responded. He went on to say: “If, I don’t know, 50 to 100 years from now, we’re…mostly sustainable, I think that’ll probably be OK.”
At first, technical difficulties hampered the chat. Some users who attempted to listen instead saw a notice saying: “Details not available.” Others were able to get into a listening room only to swiftly receive a message stating, “This Space is not available.” Confusion and jokes rushed throughout the internet, and the malfunction evoked the kind of issues that marred the presidential campaign launch of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on the platform last year.
Trump and Musk’s Vision for America
Right before the event began, Musk stated without evidence a “massive DDOS attack on X,” alluding to a distributed denial-of-service, a type of cyberattack that overwhelms a website and causes it to fail.
“There’s a lot of opposition to people just hearing what President Trump has to say,” Musk remarked as the delayed event began. Some onlookers questioned Musk’s statement, observing that the rest of the platform appeared to remain operational.
The technical issues came at a critical time for X, which Musk has been working to position as the go-to online news source ahead of the November presidential election in the United States.
It was scheduled to commence at 8 p.m. Approximately 8:35 p.m. A microphone looked to be turned on, implying that the event could begin, but then silence took over. Musk began speaking at approximately 8:42 p.m. According to the platform’s statistics, the event’s listeners surpassed one million people shortly after it began.
Earlier Monday, prior of the discussion on X’s Spaces, Trump returned to the platform with numerous posts—his first since last August, when he shared a photo of his mug photograph after surrendering at an Atlanta jail on charges of conspiracy to overturn his Georgia election loss.
Also on Monday, European Union official Thierry Breton addressed a letter to Musk warning about the bloc’s online-content laws in this context. of events including the interview, though the letter referred to a U.S. “presidential candidate” and didn’t name Trump.
The European Commission, the bloc’s executive arm, has been examining X for its handling of unlawful content and disinformation, and Breton stated in the letter that Monday’s interview is of interest to EU officials because users in the EU can view it.
X Chief Executive Linda Yaccarino commented on X writing “This is an unprecedented attempt to apply a law intended for Europe to political activities in the United States.” It also belittles European citizens, implying that they are incapable of listening to a conversation and reaching their own opinions.”
During the event, Musk stated that America required safe cities, strong borders, and deregulation, citing a second Trump term as critical to achieve those objectives.
“I think it’s incredibly important that you win for the sake of the country,” Musk said. “I’m just stating my opinion.”
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