What’s behind the Musk-Trump bust up?

President Donald Trump with far right billionaire Elon Musk last Friday (Picture: The White House)

A week ago far right billionaire Elon Musk was proclaiming himself “first buddy” to the United States president Donald Trump. 

But the picture looks very different now after the two broke out in a furious internet feud on Thursday.

What lies behind the dramatic turnaround? It can tempting to put it simply down to a clash of personalities.

But it points to deeper contradictions and fissures that run through the Trump project and its “America First” rhetoric.

The first is between Trump’s commitment to a brutal vision of capitalism and this appeal as an “anti-establishment” outsider among sections of the working class.

The feud was sparked by Musk’s opposition to Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill”, which will keep tax cuts for the super-rich and promises to slash federal spending.

Musk and other billionaires lined up behind Trump’s presidential bid because he promised a package of policies that would line their pockets. And he is committed to taking a chainsaw to federal spending—apart from the sizeable bits he benefits from—and regulations that get in the way of profiteering.

But sections of Trump’s base rely on social programmes, for instance, older voters and health care programmes.

Some 27 percent of “Medicaid” recipients identified as Republicans. Half of rural adults, including 37 percent of rural Republicans, were worried the cuts could affect their access to care, according to a KFF survey.

Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill already includes substantial federal spending cuts, including Medicaid. If it passes in its present form, about 7.8 million fewer people would be insured within a decade.

That’s partly why Republican senators are battling over how deep to cut Medicaid, fearing the impact it will have on their base.

Trump and the far right play on nostalgia for the “American Dream” and promised to restore the “birth right” of Americans.

Fascist Steve Bannon wants the administration to lean into its base and more nationalist policies. He’s already calling on Musk to be deported, saying, “They should initiate a formal investigation of his immigration status.

“I am of the strong belief that he is an illegal alien, and he should be deported from the country immediately. 

Yet, for Musk, the bill doesn’t go far enough in tearing up social spending. He said on X, “I’m sorry, but I just can’t stand it anymore. This massive, outrageous, pork-filled Congressional spending bill is a disgusting abomination.”

But you shouldn’t confuse this for some hard, ideological commitment to a “small state”.   The One Big Beautiful Bill would end a tax credit of $7,500 given to anyone buying an electric vehicle—and Musk is against this ending as it would harm Tesla.

The car company’s shares already plummeted 47.6 percent between the inauguration on 20 January and the beginning of March. They dropped a further 14 percent on Thursday alone, the equivalent of a $152 billion loss to the value of the company.

This points to another contradiction between Trump and Musk over the trade wars.

The US and Chinese economies are enmeshed with one another, but competition between the two states is the major faultline in global imperialism.

Trump, like Joe Biden and Barack Obama before him, is determined to contain China’s rise and defend US hegemony in the world. An important part of that strategy is “decoupling”—making the US less linked to China—and “reshoring”—rebuilding the US manufacturing base.

This has seen Trump launch a trade war targeting China. The trouble for Musk is that, no matter how many times he says “America First”, his Tesla and SpaceX companies have significant ties to China.

Musk was reportedly infuriated when Trump wouldn’t share a security briefing on China with him last month.

These divisions show that the Trump administration isn’t an all-powerful, united juggernaut.

But the left’s response can’t be getting out the popcorn. It will take resistance to Trump’s assaults on the streets, picket lines and campuses—and a political alternative to the Republicans and Democrats—to offer hope.