Elon Musk Isn’t Going Anywhere

Elon Musk isn’t leaving politics anytime soon, if his X posts are to be believed.

The tech mogul and fascism enthusiast posted “Fake news” Wednesday afternoon, in response to a Politico article saying that Musk is on the outs with the Trump administration following his disastrous intervention in Wisconsin’s Supreme Court election, which saw Brad Schimel, who received more than $25 million from Musk, lose handily.

Shortly after the loss was announced, Musk didn’t cry fraud but instead claimed that he didn’t expect Schimel to win and that the real victory was a voter ID law being enshrined in Wisconsin’s state Constitution. But the alarmed reactions from Republicans both in the state and around the country suggest otherwise, and they now fear similar bloodbaths in the 2026 midterms and beyond.

Democrats, meanwhile, rallied behind the news, with DNC Chair Ken Martin saying, “We should put Elon Musk into every state” and Wisconsin Democratic Party chief Ben Wikler urging Musk to stay in the Trump administration and keep talking.

“When Elon Musk comes to town, Republicans should flee in panic,” Wikler added.

On Thursday morning, Vice President JD Vance told Fox News that “DOGE has got a lot of work to do, and yeah, that work is going to continue after Elon leaves, but fundamentally, Elon is going to remain a friend and an adviser of both me and the president,” referring to Musk’s efforts to overhaul the federal government.

Musk’s time in the federal government doesn’t appear to be ending, at least in the short term, but whether he’ll continue to get involved in elections remains to be seen. Democrats are hoping he does, much as he did in Wisconsin, while the GOP fears that the world’s richest man is now more of a liability than an asset.

Judge James Boasberg thinks Stephen Miller, Tom Homan, and the rest of the Trump administration “acted in bad faith” when they invoked the Alien Enemies Act to extrajudicially deport 200 Venezuelan men to a megaprison in El Salvador on March 15.

Judge Boasberg—whose restraining order to halt the deportation plans was defied by the administration—noted that he is considering contempt for the administration’s actions. And if he does, he wants to know who to blame.

“If I don’t agree, I don’t find your legal arguments convincing, and I believe there is probable cause to find contempt, what I’m asking is how—how should I determine who [is at fault]?” Judge Boasberg raised, wanting to know who exactly decided to disobey his order to turn planes carrying deportees around. The Trump administration insists that it somehow complied with the order.

“It seems to me, there is a fair likelihood that that is not correct,” Judge Boasberg responded. “In fact, the government acted in bad faith throughout that day. You really believed everything you did that day was legal and could survive a court challenge? I can’t believe you ever would have operated in the way you did.

“Why wouldn’t the prudent thing be to say, ‘Let’s slow down here. Let’s see what the judge says. He’s already enjoined the removal of five people; certainly in the realm of possibility that he would enjoin further removal. Let’s see what he says, and if he doesn’t enjoin it, we can go ahead. But surely better to be safe than risk violating the order,’” Boasberg asked the Justice Department lawyers.

The Justice Department also invoked the state secrets privilege to avoid having to give Judge Boasberg any more information about the deportation flights, which Boasberg called “pretty sketchy-looking.” The Justice Department insisted that revealing the information could have “diplomatic consequences.”

“Like what?” Judge Boasberg replied, noting that he has discussed confidential matters in closed sessions before.

The Trump administration insists that all 200 of these men are dangerous, hardened members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua, hence the wartime Alien Enemies Act. This is completely false. Now innocent people are sitting in one of the most brutal prisons in the world.

Judge Boasberg plans to issue a ruling this week.

Donald Trump thinks everything is going just fine with his insane tariffs.

In his lone statement about the tariffs Thursday, Trump didn’t seem bothered when a reporter asked him, “The markets today are way down. The worst day in years. Because of the tariffs. So, how’s it going?”

“I think it’s going very well. It was an operation like when a patient gets operated on, and it’s a big thing. I said this would be exactly the way it is. We have six or seven trillion dollars coming into our country, and we’ve never seen anything like it,” Trump said, repeating what he said in a Truth Social post hours earlier. “The markets are going to boom, the stock is going to boom, the country is going to boom, and the rest of the world wants to see, is there any way they can make a deal?”

“They’ve taken advantage of us for many, many years. For many years, we’ve been at the wrong side of the ball, and I tell you what, I think it’s going to be unbelievable,” Trump added.

Right now, international markets aren’t agreeing with Trump’s ideas, with stock indexes plummeting everywhere. Criticism has come from fellow Republicans and former Trump administration officials, and some companies, such as automaker Stellantis, are laying off employees. Republicans and Democrats in the Senate are even working together on a bill to rein the president in, although it is unlikely to pass.

And the rest of the world isn’t lining up to make deals: Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney strongly rebuked the tariffs Thursday, saying that America’s economic dominance is over. France’s Emmanuel Macron has called for European companies to stop investing in America. Right now, this “medical operation” is crippling Americans.

President Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs have already resulted in even more GOP infighting, according to Punchbowl News.

“There’s a massive disconnect between the White House and Capitol Hill Republicans on tariffs right now,” Jake Sherman wrote on X. “Here on the Hill, Republicans keep saying “well, this is the beginning of a negotiation. The administration says that this is not a negotiation.”

These tariffs—placed on friend and foe alike—are certain to drive up costs for both manufacturers and consumers, especially in red, rural states that rely on foreign goods in both imports and exports. This feeble attempt to spin these tariffs into a “negotiation” falls flat in the face of an administration that is touting them as law. Trump has been very clear that he believes the tariffs will be so successful that they will replace the income tax and make the country wealthier than it has been at any point in its history—not that he is levying them in order to make marginally better trading deals.

Senior Senate Republican Chuck Grassley has already moved to take action against Trump with his Trade Review Act of 2025, a bill that—while almost certainly dead on arrival—demonstrates the uncomfortable decisions that many Republicans will soon be forced to make as their president’s wanton tariffs make everything more expensive for constituents already struggling.

This is the second sign of internal disunity in 24 hours. On Thursday, it was reported that far-right crank Laura Loomer had an Oval Office meeting in which she convinced the president to fire multiple members of the National Security Council on the grounds that they were “neocons.” Loomer denies this report.

Canada has brutally dumped the United States over its tariffs … again.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney issued a strong rebuke Thursday of Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs on nearly every country in the world. 

“The global economy is fundamentally different today than it was yesterday,” Carney said. “The system of global trade anchored on the United States, that Canada has relied on since the end of the second World War—a system that, while not perfect, has helped to deliver prosperity to our country for decades—is over.

“Our old relationship of steadily deepening integration with the United States is over. The 80-year period when the United States embraced the mantle of global economic leadership, when it forged alliances rooted in trust and mutual respect, and championed the free and open exchange of goods and services is over,” Carney continued. “While this is a tragedy, it is also the new reality.

“We must respond with both purpose and force. We are a free, sovereign, and ambitious country. We are masters in our own home,” he added.  

Trump’s announcement does mark the end of U.S. leadership in global trade, favoring the kind of protectionist economic policy that drove the U.S. into the Great Depression nearly 100 years ago. And Carney, who is a former central banker and a former deputy minister for Canada’s Finance Department, likely understands exactly how destructive Trump’s tariff policy would be. 

Canada was spared from Trump’s newest tariff announcement, because the president had already levied steep 25 percent tariffs on all imports to the U.S. More than 100 U.S. trading partners were hit with a baseline tariff of 10 percent or more Wednesday. 

Last week, Carney slammed Trump’s “permanent” 25 percent tariff on all imported vehicles and autoparts as a “direct attack” on Canadian autoworkers, and in a stunning break with its longtime ally, Carney announced that Canada’s relationship with the U.S. was “over.” Carney had warned that Canada, which is currently one of the top importers of U.S. goods, totaling $412.7 billion in 2024, would need to reshape its economy to wean itself off its southern neighbor.

Carney doubled down on this threat Thursday, saying that Canada would begin “looking elsewhere to expand” its trade partnerships. Earlier Thursday, he posted on X that he had already spoken to German Chancellor Olaf Scholz about expanding trade relations between the two countries.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced plans to cut $580 million in “wasteful spending” at the Pentagon, but the major slashes to grants and contracts will spare Elon Musk’s SpaceX, The Intercept reported Thursday.

Over the past 25 years, the Pentagon’s contracts with SpaceX have only grown, totaling almost $8 billion. Musk and his businesses have received a whopping $38 billion in total government contracts. On March 21, the day after Hegseth announced the sweeping cuts, he had a private meeting with Musk. In a post on X, Hegseth said the two had discussed “innovation, efficiencies & smarter production.”

Despite Hegseth’s cuts, Musk, who heads the government’s cost-cutting efforts, is poised to make a killing from upcoming defense contracts to work on new rocket launchpads and rocket-booster landing zones, as well as Donald Trump’s fantasies of creating a “Golden Dome” missile defense system that is projected to cost up to $2.5 trillion—more than double the Pentagon’s currently enormous budget.

Stephen Semler, a senior fellow at the Center for International Policy, told The Intercept that since the election, SpaceX has become the Pentagon’s “most valued” contractor. Musk’s financial support of the Trump administration had boosted investor confidence that there would be kickbacks, he explained.

“Musk and DOGE are ignoring the one place where you would actually find savings within the government,” Semler said. “Musk realizes that although he is already getting tons of money from NASA contracts, the untapped potential for his businesses from the Pentagon budget is truly massive.”

Rather than make cuts to SpaceX contracts, Hegseth opted to eliminate programs such as the Defense Civilian Human Resources Management System, which Hegseth claimed had ballooned to 780 percent over budget. Hegseth said that in addition to cuts announced in February, the Defense Department was now prepared to cut a total of around $800 million from its budget—a comparatively small slice of the Pentagon’s nearly $1 trillion budget.

William Hartung, a senior research fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, told The Intercept that proposed cuts were still “extremely modest” when compared to other agencies. “And unlike these other agencies, savings found in one part of the Pentagon will simply be invested in other Pentagon programs, with no net reduction in the department’s bottom line,” he added.

Republicans and Democrats in the Senate are proposing a bipartisan bill to try and rein in President Trump’s crazy tariffs.

Iowa Republican Chuck Grassley and Washington Democrat Maria Cantwell, both members of the Senate Finance Committee, are co-sponsoring the “Trade Review Act of 2025,” which would require congressional approval for the president to impose new tariffs, one day after Trump’s “Liberation Day” event upended international markets.

Specifically, Trump would have to notify Congress about new tariffs within 48 hours of imposing them, and then the House and Senate would have 60 days to approve them or else the tariffs would expire. According to the two senators, the bill is modeled after the War Powers Resolution of 1973, which places limits on the president’s ability to deploy troops overseas without congressional approval.

In a statement, Grassley said, “For too long, Congress has delegated its clear authority to regulate interstate and foreign commerce to the executive branch.”

“I’m joining Senator Cantwell to introduce the bipartisan Trade Review Act of 2025 to reassert Congress’ constitutional role and ensure Congress has a voice in trade policy,” the statement added.

Cantwell said that the bill was necessary to reassert “Congress’s role over trade policy to ensure rules-based trade policies are transparent, consistent, and benefit the American public.

“Arbitrarily, tariffs, particularly on our allies, damage U.S. export opportunities and raise prices for American consumers and businesses. As representatives of the American people, Congress has a duty to stop actions that will cause them harm,” Cantwell’s statement said.

But the bill faces little chance of passing, especially considering that its House companion has no Republican co-sponsors and would likely be blocked by House Speaker Mike Johnson. Johnson praised the tariffs on X Wednesday night, claiming that they “level the playing field for American workers and innovators.” Even if, by some miracle, the bill passes the House, Trump would likely veto it. The War Powers Act of 1973, moreover, has been proven time and time again to be toothless—presidents have deployed troops on a number of occasions without congressional approval.

It looks like the country will be in economic free fall for a while.

American companies are not “leaping” to hire new employees, as the White House promised. Instead, they’re rapidly letting them go.

Stellantis—one of the Big Three automakers in the U.S.—announced Thursday that it would be laying off hundreds of U.S. workers in the wake of Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs. The company is also planning to temporarily pause production at two foreign assembly plants in Canada and Mexico.

“We are continuing to assess the medium- and long-term effects of these tariffs on our operations, but also have decided to take some immediate actions, including temporarily pausing production at some of our Canadian and Mexican assembly plants,” Chief Operating Officer Antonio Filosa told employees in an email on Thursday.

Some 900 U.S.-based employees are expected to be laid off at Stellantis’s Warren Stamping and Sterling Stamping plants in Michigan, as well as three of its transmission and casting plants in Indiana.

Speaking with CBS earlier Thursday, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick had claimed that “people are going to start building factories right now” and that companies will “employ Americans today.”

“Factories rebuilding, all the ships are going to be running hot across America now; you’re going to see employment leaping starting today,” Lutnick said.

But Lutnick’s insistence on following Trump’s tariff plan has veered totally into the delusional. In an interview with CNN the same day, Lutnick implored voters and investors to “let Donald Trump run the global economy,” promising that Trump would cut deals “if and only if these countries can change everything about themselves.”

Wall Street analysts have predicted bad news for automakers and their investors as they attempt to navigate Trump’s 25 percent tariff on imported vehicles and auto parts, which took effect Thursday. In the near term, that will look like increased market volatility and shaken supply chains.

While there are vehicles that are assembled in America, there are no vehicles in the U.S. that are made entirely with domestic products and labor. Instead, producing a car or a truck requires thousands of parts that are sourced from the global supply chain—an international relationship that Trump’s tariffs will undoubtedly hurt.

“We stress that the concept of a U.S. car maker with parts all from the U.S. is a fictional tale that does not exist and would take years to make this concept a reality,” Wedbush analyst Dan Ives wrote in an investor note Wednesday obtained by CNBC.

Multiple National Security Council staffers have been fired at the behest of MAGA conspiracy theorist and Trump loyalist Laura Loomer, according to Axios and the Associated Press.

The NSC, headed by Mike Waltz, made headlines after Signalgate, in which Waltz inadvertently added The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg to a Signal chat where multiple Cabinet members were discussing plans to bomb Yemen.

A source close to the situation told Axios that the firings were “being labeled as an anti-neocon move.” Waltz has been accused of being insufficiently MAGA by the farthest right of the party.

Loomer apparently “presented [Trump] with her research and evidence” alleging that more traditional neoconservative foreign policy hawks were too well represented in the administration.

Loomer, who Trump has described as a “free spirit,” is a “proud Islamophobe” who was pushed out of Trump’s inner circle during the campaign due to numerous statements that were deemed too incendiary for MAGA. She’s stated that 9/11 was an “inside job” and that the White House would “smell like curry” if Kamala Harris, who is of Indian descent, won the election.

This may be the worst time to allow a crank like Loomer back into the fold. The Signalgate controversy has already demonstrated the administration’s capacity for foolishness, and relationships with the rest of the world are arguably at an all-time low, thanks to Trump’s suicidal tariff regimen.

Loomer has declined to share any of what she discussed in her Oval Office meeting.

Steven Mnuchin, the treasury secretary during Donald Trump’s first term, is worried about the president’s new tariffs and hoping to change them via the president’s favorite medium: television.

On CNBC Thursday morning, Mnuchin tried to delicately ask for carve-outs and concessions, attempting to explain that “there’s a transition period here that needs to be adjusted to.

“It’s the larger tariffs that are called the reciprocal tariffs. I’m hopeful that those will be negotiated down, that those will bring people to the table, that those will be negotiated down. For many businesses, it takes a while to move the manufacturing base,” Mnuchin said.

“I hope the president will consider giving people credits for those people who have made real commitments, not just announcements, but real commitments, to build in the U.S,” added the longtime investment banker.

Mnuchin is not on bad terms with Trump or the administration, but it’s telling that he’s willing to point out some of the obvious flaws in Trump’s half-baked economic plan. And only last month he said that “people are overreacting a bit” to the administration’s policy changes.

“I don’t think we’re going to have a recession. I don’t think the outlook looks like we’re going to have a recession. And Larry Summers saying there’s a 50 percent probability, I just don’t agree with that,” Mnuchin said on CNBC at the time, referring to comments from another former Treasury head. The interview is a window into the way Mnuchin, who was widely seen as one of the “adults in the room” during his first term, likely approached the president when he served as his treasury secretary: as a toddler.

While Mnuchin didn’t mention a recession in Thursday’s interview, it’s clear he’s now worried about Trump’s actions and is hoping that, from behind a TV screen, Trump might see some sense with a very mild recommendation. Maybe he should be overreacting now.