While meeting with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz in the Oval Office, President Trump spoke about Elon Musk and the Tesla CEO's opposition to the Big Beautiful Bill.
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00It's an achievement, actually.
00:01Mr. President, can we follow up on the autopilot?
00:04Thank you, Mr. President.
00:05The criticism that I've seen, and I'm sure you've seen, regarding Elon Musk and your big, beautiful bill,
00:10what's your reaction to that?
00:12Do you think it in any way hurts passage in the Senate, which, of course, what is your seeking?
00:17Well, look, you know, I've always liked Elon, and I was always very surprised.
00:20You saw the words he had for me, the words.
00:23And he hasn't said anything about me that's bad.
00:25I'd rather have him criticize me than the bill, because the bill is incredible.
00:31It's the biggest cut in the history of our country.
00:33We've never cut.
00:35It's about 1.6 trillion in cuts.
00:37It's the biggest tax cut.
00:40Tax, you would say, people's taxes will go way down.
00:45But it's the biggest tax cut in history.
00:47We are doing things in that bill that are unbelievable.
00:51And when you look at what we're doing for small businesses, for people, for middle-income people,
00:58all of the things that we're doing, nobody's ever seen anything like it.
01:03And, you know, Elon's upset because we took the EV mandate, which was a lot of money for electric vehicles.
01:10And, you know, they're having a hard time, the electric vehicles.
01:13And they want us to pay billions of dollars in subsidy.
01:18And, you know, Elon knew this from the beginning.
01:22He knew it for a long time ago.
01:23That's been in there.
01:24That's been, I would say, J.D., that hasn't changed.
01:27That's been right from the beginning.
01:29I think, Mr. Secretary, that hasn't changed at all, right from the beginning.
01:33But I know that disturbed him.
01:35He wanted, and rightfully, you know, he recommended somebody from, that he, I guess, knew very well,
01:43I'm sure he respected him, but to run NASA, and I didn't think it was appropriate.
01:48And he happened to be a Democrat, like, totally Democrat.
01:53And I say, you know, look, we won.
01:55We get certain privileges, and one of the privileges, we don't have to appoint a Democrat.
01:59NASA is very important.
02:00We have great people.
02:01General Cain is going to be picking somebody with our, we'll be checking him out, seeing,
02:09but he wanted that person, a certain person, and we said no.
02:14And, you know, I can understand why he's upset.
02:16Remember, he was here for a long time.
02:19You saw a man who was very happy when he stood behind the Oval Desk,
02:24and even with a black eye, I said, do you want a little makeup?
02:28We'll get you a little makeup.
02:29But he said, no, I don't think so.
02:31Which is interesting and very nice.
02:34He wants to be who he is, so you could make that statement, too, I guess.
02:38Look, Elon and I had a great relationship.
02:42I don't know if we will anymore.
02:44I was surprised, because you were here.
02:46Everybody in this room practically was here, as we had a wonderful send-off.
02:50He said wonderful things about me.
02:51He couldn't have nicer.
02:52He said the best thing.
02:54He's worn the hat.
02:55Trump was right about everything.
02:57And I am right about the great, big, beautiful bill.
03:01We call it a great, big, beautiful bill, because that's what it is.
03:05And, again, biggest tax cuts in history, biggest economic development moves anywhere.
03:10We've never done anything like it.
03:13Businesses spurred.
03:15And I don't know if you've seen the numbers, but the numbers came out.
03:17Even the CBO, which is run by Democrats, said that we're going to be doing it.
03:23You know, I'd like you to discuss it, the 2.8 trillion, that CBO.
03:27So, this is a group of people that are Democrats.
03:31They're very hostile to us.
03:33They just came out with phenomenal numbers what it does.
03:36Do you want to mention that, Scott?
03:37Yes, sir.
03:38So, what...