Over the weekend, as Elon Musk launched into a barrage of social media posts criticizing one of the lead White House advisers for President Donald Trump’s aggressive tariff plan, Musk was going over that same official’s head — and making personal appeals to Trump.
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The attempted intervention, confirmed by two people familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private talks, has not brought success so far; Trump threatened Monday to add new 50 percent tariffs on imports from China to go along with the 34 percent taxes he announced last week. (The president did signal he was open to negotiations on some aspects of his policy.) Musk, meanwhile, posted a video to X in which the late conservative economist Milton Friedman touted the benefits of international trade cooperation — “the impersonal operation of prices,” as he put it — breaking down the sources of the materials that go into a simple wooden pencil.
Musk’s break with Trump over a signature administration priority marks the highest-profile disagreement between the president and one of his key advisers, who poured nearly $290 million into backing him and other Republicans in last year’s elections and has been leading the U.S. DOGE Service’s cost-cutting efforts since January. Musk has also disagreed with other members of Trump’s coalition on issues such as H1-B visas for skilled immigrants and on DOGE’s approach to government spending.
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On Saturday, Musk took aim at the administration official who has been key to developing the tariff plans, White House trade adviser Peter Navarro, lighting into his credentials.
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“A PhD in Econ from Harvard is a bad thing, not a good thing,” Musk wrote.
On Tuesday morning, Musk again targeted Navarro in a series of X posts, as he responded to comments made by Navarro on CNBC calling Musk a “car assembler,” rather than a manufacturer “in many cases.”
“Navarro is truly a moron,” Musk said in one post decrying the claim as false, before calling him “dumber than a sack of bricks” in another, and following up by defending Tesla, saying it is “the most vertically integrated auto manufacturer in America with the highest percentage of US content.”
Musk concluded by saying, “Navarro should ask the fake expert he invented, Ron Vara,” a reference to Navarro’s reported use of a fictional trade expert — an anagram of his last name — in his books.
Navarro did not respond to a request for comment Monday, nor did he immediately respond to a follow-up Tuesday.
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“The President has put together a remarkable team of highly talented and experienced individuals who bring different ideas to the table, knowing that President Trump is the ultimate decision maker,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement Monday evening. “When he makes a decision everyone rows in the same direction to execute. That’s why this Administration has done more in two months than the previous Admin did in four years.”
In an interview with Italian Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini over the weekend, Musk also said he would like to see a “free trade zone” between Europe and the United States: “At the end of the day, I hope it’s agreed that both Europe and the United States should move ideally, in my view, to a zero-tariff situation.”
Musk also said that he would like more freedom for people to move between countries in Europe and the United States and work in either “if they wish.”
“That has certainly been my advice to the president,” he said.
Get a curated selection of 10 of our best stories in your inbox every weekend.
The attempted intervention, confirmed by two people familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private talks, has not brought success so far; Trump threatened Monday to add new 50 percent tariffs on imports from China to go along with the 34 percent taxes he announced last week. (The president did signal he was open to negotiations on some aspects of his policy.) Musk, meanwhile, posted a video to X in which the late conservative economist Milton Friedman touted the benefits of international trade cooperation — “the impersonal operation of prices,” as he put it — breaking down the sources of the materials that go into a simple wooden pencil.
Musk’s break with Trump over a signature administration priority marks the highest-profile disagreement between the president and one of his key advisers, who poured nearly $290 million into backing him and other Republicans in last year’s elections and has been leading the U.S. DOGE Service’s cost-cutting efforts since January. Musk has also disagreed with other members of Trump’s coalition on issues such as H1-B visas for skilled immigrants and on DOGE’s approach to government spending.
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On Saturday, Musk took aim at the administration official who has been key to developing the tariff plans, White House trade adviser Peter Navarro, lighting into his credentials.
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“A PhD in Econ from Harvard is a bad thing, not a good thing,” Musk wrote.
On Tuesday morning, Musk again targeted Navarro in a series of X posts, as he responded to comments made by Navarro on CNBC calling Musk a “car assembler,” rather than a manufacturer “in many cases.”
“Navarro is truly a moron,” Musk said in one post decrying the claim as false, before calling him “dumber than a sack of bricks” in another, and following up by defending Tesla, saying it is “the most vertically integrated auto manufacturer in America with the highest percentage of US content.”
Musk concluded by saying, “Navarro should ask the fake expert he invented, Ron Vara,” a reference to Navarro’s reported use of a fictional trade expert — an anagram of his last name — in his books.
Navarro did not respond to a request for comment Monday, nor did he immediately respond to a follow-up Tuesday.
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“The President has put together a remarkable team of highly talented and experienced individuals who bring different ideas to the table, knowing that President Trump is the ultimate decision maker,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement Monday evening. “When he makes a decision everyone rows in the same direction to execute. That’s why this Administration has done more in two months than the previous Admin did in four years.”
In an interview with Italian Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini over the weekend, Musk also said he would like to see a “free trade zone” between Europe and the United States: “At the end of the day, I hope it’s agreed that both Europe and the United States should move ideally, in my view, to a zero-tariff situation.”
Musk also said that he would like more freedom for people to move between countries in Europe and the United States and work in either “if they wish.”
“That has certainly been my advice to the president,” he said.
