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00:00Hi, I'm Diana Macedo. Let's get right to our top story. President Trump says Elon Musk wants to
00:04talk to him, but that the president's not particularly interested as their very public
00:10feud is playing out. Trump told our John Carl earlier on the phone that Musk has, quote,
00:15lost his mind. This whole thing started as a fight over the president's bill, but now the
00:19president's threatening to cancel Musk's government contracts, and Musk is threatening to pull
00:24NASA's ride to the International Space Station. Let's get right to White House correspondent
00:28Karen Travers. Karen, what's the latest here? The latest, Diane, is that things seem to have
00:33cooled off today compared to where we were yesterday with those messages flying back and
00:38forth between Elon Musk and President Trump, and of course, President Trump's comments in the Oval
00:43Office. The president today seems to be trying to change the subject, move beyond that feud with
00:48Elon Musk, talking on social media about the economy and his policies, anything but those
00:55messages yesterday. But the president talked to John Carl, or John Carl, earlier this morning,
00:59and he did not seem particularly concerned about it. In fact, he said that he was not interested
01:05in talking to Elon Musk, even though Musk wanted to talk to him. People around the president say he
01:11seems to be more sad about all of this than angry. Diane, the president has two events on his public
01:17schedule today before he leaves the White House to head to New Jersey. So far, both of those events
01:21are closed to reporters, but we are waiting to see if they bring in the press pool, because you can
01:25imagine what some of the first questions the president will get asked. Karen, this is more
01:30complicated than just a feud between two men. You're talking about the president of the United
01:34States, the richest man in the world, and Musk also has these billion-dollar-worth government
01:39contracts, right? $20 billion worth. So what does that mean, big picture? What's at stake here?
01:44The president yesterday at one point on Truth Social, his social media platform, threatened to cancel
01:50all of Elon Musk's contracts with the federal government. It's $20 billion across multiple
01:56companies. The president did not walk that back, and that's significant. Elon Musk threatened to pull
02:02back the Dragon spacecraft from working with NASA to take astronauts to and from the International
02:07Space Station. It's the only way that NASA can do that. He later said, though, that he wouldn't do
02:13that. He walked it back. But it's significant that how much of that business that Elon Musk and his
02:18companies have with the federal government. The Defense Department relies on them for getting
02:23satellites into space. There's Internet issues that the federal government has contracts with
02:28Starlink to do rural access to Internet across the country and also overseas, and also electric
02:34vehicles that Tesla has contracts with different federal agencies. So, Diane, it's a big question
02:40today for the White House and for the president about that threat to cut those contracts. What would the
02:45alternative be if the government wasn't in business with Elon Musk? All right, Kevin Travers at the
02:50White House for us. Thanks, Karen. Now, let's bring in ABC News executive editorial producer John
02:55Santucci for more. John, Elon Musk wasn't just considered one of Trump's closest advisors. These
03:00two were spending holidays together not long ago. So, how did they go from that to here so quickly?
03:06I mean, Uncle Elon at some point is what Don Jr.'s children would refer to him as because he was so
03:12president just hanging around watching Donald Trump golf on the weekends down in Florida, Diane.
03:17I mean, think about the relationship the last few months that we saw in the White House. But let's
03:22rewind the clock a little bit. Think about the transition, right? If you think about Trump 1.0,
03:28Donald Trump, we saw everything that was happening. He was out in New Jersey showing off his cabinet.
03:32This time, you didn't see anything. It was all behind closed doors. And really,
03:36it was Donald Trump with Elon Musk. Elon Musk weighed in on every cabinet pick this time around.
03:42So, I think that that relationship really transitioned from close friend, ally, to really
03:51somebody that became a senior advisor on just about everything. And I have to tell you, last night,
03:57talking to many people around the Trump White House, one of the things they said about Elon Musk that
04:02they were concerned about is how much knowledge he's obtained, not just on the government, but on
04:07Donald Trump.
04:08So, what does that mean? Because he had a lot of access to government information in addition to
04:13whatever he knows about the president himself. So, what does that mean now that they've had this
04:17falling out?
04:17Well, look, I mean, last night, I can say there's very few things in life that have surprised me
04:22about Donald Trump in 10 years of covering him. When I saw the tweet about Jeffrey Epstein,
04:26my phone fell out of my hand. Because to think that that's like really shots fired against the
04:32president, I mean, that's a real open threat, a real hostile thing to say, clearly. He called it
04:37himself a big bomb. So, I mean, I think that what's going to be fascinating is do they try to patch this
04:44up? You know, Karen just said right there that obviously over the last 12 hours, we saw Elon dial it
04:50back. We heard this reporting there'd be a phone call today. But what John Carl heard this morning from
04:55President Trump is that, nah, I'm not interested in speaking to him. So, personally, I think for
05:01everyone today, have your Twitter notifications on for Elon Musk to see what he now does in response to
05:07it. But I think that really the dynamic of what's inside the government, you know, our colleague, Will
05:14Stakin, who's covered Elon Musk for quite some time, you know, one of the things he pointed out to me, and he's
05:19right, is Doge and all those employees. They're still there. They were doing the work that was at the
05:25behest of Elon Musk. What happens to them? Now, where do you see this heading next?
05:31Well, I think one of the things that I'm curious to see is the response from Elon, right? So,
05:35basically, this has been a game of back and forth tennis. Donald Trump threw the serve this morning
05:39saying, I don't want to talk to him. So, what does Elon do? Does he actually wind it back and just sort
05:46of sit back? Or does he respond? Does he actually turn the heat back up? That's part one. Part two,
05:51I want to see what happens inside the government. We talked about the contracts with the companies.
05:57I want to see what happens with the Elon Musk people that are there, the Doge people, the AI czar,
06:03the crypto czar. Those are all friends and allies of Elon Musk that were brought to the Trump party by
06:08him. Do they stay? Do they get kicked out? Can't wait to see for the weekend Twitter wars.
06:13All right. John Santucci, thank you. Thanks, Diane.