Bulwark Takes - BREAKING: Elon Goes Scorched Earth Over Trump’s Big Bill

Episode Date: June 3, 2025

Tim Miller, Sam Stein, and Joe Perticone discuss Elon Musk’s explosive reaction to Trump’s big beautiful bill as Donald and Elon’s very public breakup intensifies after Elon’s departure from the administration.

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This free virtual event brings together leaders like Senator Heidi Heitkamp, Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Governor Andy Beshear, and others for real talk and real solutions. Together we'll tackle the most urgent issues facing rural America. Register today or learn more at ruralprogress.com. Hey everybody, it's Tim Miller from The Bullwork here

with managing editor Sam Stein and Joe Pertico and our man on Capitol Hill. Elon Musk has dropped a nuclear bomb on the big beautiful bill. That big beautiful turd, it is a just a straight attack, not, you know, he did kind of the passive aggressive attack that Sam and I talked about yesterday on CBS Sunday morning. You know, I was like disappointed to see the massive spending bill, frankly, which increases the budget deficit, not just decrease it. And it reminds the work that the Doge team is doing.

We kind of saw this coming. The Trump must break up. But Musk, who knows what could be behind this? The fact that he's so erratic, possibly something in a pillbox. But I don't know. He's so erratic, it has broken out into public view, a full frontal attack on the BBB. Let me read the tweets and I'll get your guys' responses. I'm sorry, but I just can't stand it anymore. A little melodramatic. So dramatic.

This massive, outrageous, pork-filled congressional spending bill is a disgusting abomination. Shame on those who voted for it. You know you did wrong. You know it. He followed that up. He quote tweeted himself. That was not enough. He said it will massively increase the already gigantic budget deficit to 2.5 trillion, exclamation, exclamation, exclamation, and burden American citizens with crushingly unsustainable debt. There is Elon. Sam, what do you make of it? Well, I mean, I think, again, you asked the really important questions as you always do, because you're so gifted at this, which is what was in the pillbox? We don't know what was in the pillbox. I could explain a lot of this. Ass assuming that it was just, you know, simple ketamine and not anything more than that.

It is odd, I have to say. He could have said this at any point in time. He has kind of hinted at that. He hates this bill, or at least was opposed to it. So I guess, yeah, he's left the administration now. He feels like he can let it out. And maybe he is a little bit aggrieved at how they didn't like, you know, codified Doge or something like that. I'm kind of curious, curious if that's part of it, because then

you have Mike Johnson, the speaker of the house who was in a press briefing was like, I spoke to you for 20 minutes on the phone yesterday. Like he has it all wrong. And with all due respect, my friend, Elon is terribly wrong about the one big beautiful bill. We had a long conversation yesterday He and I spoke for I think more than 20 minutes on the telephone and I stole the health of virtues of the bill He seemed to understand that we had a very friendly conversation about it I will say and you and Joe could speak this better than me because I was never of this ill

but like it does seem to be following kind of a common path for The the the fiscal conservatives who get upset at like seeing their party Abandoned all the virtues that they held dear and he just seems to be like 10 years behind the curve I'm saying he doesn't sound much different than Alan Simpson. I don't know. Maybe that's true Simpson Tom Massey, you know Rand Paul They all get this appalled Ryan Joe, what are folks saying on the Hill? You've talked to some senators I hear. So Elon sent this tweet out in the middle

of the Senate Republicans lunch that they do every day or every couple of times a week. So I was told by Ron Johnson that they were passing phones around showing it to each other. And they were like, oh shit. They don't have their own phones They could I just look at it. I think some of them are some of them are a little quicker on the draw I do know there's a few there's a few flip phones

Still grass in it. Yeah But they were passing it around and then they came out and a lot of them were no comments and even Tuberville was a no Comment, but you know Ron Johnson was Johnson was like, look, he's right, but it's up to us. This is our thing. But he said, yeah, he's right. This is a bad thing. But Johnson's the one to post. John Thune's reaction was extremely funny because he was just like, yeah, once he learns more about this bill and learns more about the process, then I think he's going to come around like all of us. And then I had a lobbyist text me that basically, like the argument that Elon's making though is the same, like he's appealing to the Freedom Caucus with this argument. First of all, they've already voted. Second, their true boss is

Trump, it's not Elon. So the idea that it will move things in any way, it's not happening. It was a headache for them. Joe, does it not give them a little bit of, I mean, so it has to go back to the house eventually because the sentence can change it. Does it not give them cover to like, you know, throw more hissy fits than they did? Oh yeah. Like they'll, they'll get to complain and do more of that, but like they're going to anyway.

I think he already voted for it. Yeah. Yeah. That's the funny part is that he said, this thing was a big turn and you voted for it. Shame on you. Yeah. And he, he was a little uneasy about it beforehand, but it's like the time to do this,

cause like the Senate's gonna figure things out on their own, but like the time to do this was before the house voted on it. Yeah. Joe, I have a couple of questions for you. The first one I asked Catherine Rampel this morning, and neither of us really could come up with a satisfactory answer, which is, who really likes this bill? Like, when you talk down the hill, I understand.

Like, in the Senate right now, there's a group that has concern about the Medicaid portion and the cuts. That's basically Holly Collins, Murkowski. There's the Rand Paul and Ron Johnson group that is concerned about the debt. Who is like really the champion? Who's excited about it? So if you looked at like the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act from the first Trump term, the people who liked it was Paul Ryan, because cut the corporate tax rate and that was it. Joe, we are still aligned. This is what I said this morning on the pod, but keep going.

This time around, they're just kind of like doing the Paul Ryan thing. They're like, we're going to get these wealthy tax cuts and we're going to do anything to accomplish it. And no one, like everyone hates or is like tolerating certain things. So like they've all decided that they'll tolerate like work requirements for Medicaid. They've all decided they're going to tolerate like the cuts to Medicaid. But beyond that, there's really no, yeah, like there's no, yeah, beyond that there's nobody, there's nobody that like is all gung ho about this thing other than leadership. And that's because they're receiving

this direction from the White House. Aren't like super, aren't super wealthy Americans super gung ho. They want their tax rates to stay low. David Sacks is really psyched about it. David Sacks? Yeah. Not really, actually. I was listening to All In and David Sacks, like, kept having to apologize for it, basically. A lot of the, sure, a lot of wealthy, wealthy salaried Americans are really excited about it. Right. Because corporations, not all corporations like it because it gets rid of those tax credits. So that's not across the board. I'm sure the chamber is kind of muted on this. And some really rich people are concerned about the markets, like the bond market and stock market reaction to this. So I mean, look, salaried rich people, it's good for, it honestly feels like an inertia type thing. And that's why

I do that it's going through because they just got to do something they can't do nothing. And and and like, and so this is where I do wonder, I kind of wish if you wanted called me, I'd have been like, Elon, really, you need to lean in to some of the other elements of the bill besides the debt. I don't know that you can get enough people on the debt, but I think if you leaned into impact on interest rates, cuts, Medicaid, I think there are some gettable Republicans, maybe or maybe not. I guess my problem is there are four. So let's do the math, Joe. Collins and Murkowski are no, let's just say. They might come around, but let's just, for the exercise. Rand holds solid in his no because of the debt. One other person

has to be no. Is that Ron Johnson? You get him on debt? Like, who else could you get to kill? Who else would have the balls to kill the bill? It's hard to imagine. Holly? No, Holly, he's not. He'll come around. But I think they're Ron Johnson and it's a matter of not will Ron Johnson hold firm. It's a matter of is he going to run for reelection or not? That's what it's about. Yeah. What she's way of doing again.

I think Joan Ernst will have a moment where she contemplates saying no and then, you know, announces that well, we're all going to die. Well, we all are going to die. So, for heaven's sakes, well, we're all going to die. Well, we all are going to die. There could have been some more effective hits on the bill for Elon. I just like as a deficit hawk, I'm thrilled. We keep picking up new fans every day. Now, like we're out in the wilderness for years, the deficit hawks, and all of a sudden some Democrats are coming on the pod talking about the deficit.

Elon's talking about it. Ron Johnson. We're getting close to a bipartisan coalition here, but I don't think that it's the most salient thing for Elon to do to kill the bill, I guess. Tim, you asked me the question, but I want to pose it to you. What do you think Elon's end game is here? Why is he doing this? I think Elon's just fucking pissed.

I think he's just... Elon is 50% boy. Like that would sk- you hate to hand it to Trump, but he was right. Like, Elon is lashing out. He didn't get everything that he wanted. And I think, so I think there's a combination of things happening. One, the Doge cuts aren't codified. So he wanted that for his own ego, really more than he cares about the actual policy. Two, I, if you just, I hate to use these fuckers as a Rosetta Stone, but if you listen to those all in boys who are his friends, if you, I listened to their whole podcast on BBB and like they are really concerned

about a couple of things. One, like the debt impact on interest rates and like how interest is going to stay really high and how that's going to be a very big problem for investment, etc, etc. Then they have also some like random issues with various things that have been cut that they like, like little cut, you know, credits for various things. There's a cut of funding in nuclear. So I think that is like buddies are in his ears on some like random niche things that they don't like, plus also the interest rate big picture. The Doge cuts aren't codified and he got pushed out and people aren't being nice enough to him and who knows what his what his cocktail regimen

is. Do these guys in your when you listen to do they ever consider maybe like not keeping tax rates super low for like the top 1% or now? It's funny. Yeah, because that came up on the pod and no, not really. We care about this shit, but not that much. Okay. Got it.

There's, there's also in the bill, they're getting rid of the tax credits for electric vehicles and home solar energy, uh, which is like a direct hit to Elon's wallet, which could be pissing them off even more. I still don't see it. I still don't see a breakup with him in Trump. I still don't see it. Yeah. A couple other things I wanted to bring up just cause I was on his Twitter feed for,

if you're looking for evidence of whether it's a full breakup since the, I'm so, it's also funny, like, Elon is so shallow and manipulative, but he could like say things like, like shame on you who voted for it, you know you did wrong. And then the next minute be like, hey buddy. If I'm shouting shame, shame at somebody, I guess it's going to be a little minute for us to repair our relationship. That's an issue for Elon. He was retweeting Mike Lee two seconds later. The other thing is, tweeting Mike Lee, like two seconds later. The other thing is, you know, he is still leaning in on his stuff. He did a tweet about how USAID funds terrorism, right before. So like

again, to your point, Joe, like, like the messaging is very freedom caucus oriented. And I think that kind of, you could almost imagine an alternate history, like I'm where the breakup happened a month ago, and Elon like riles up that caucus and maybe like gets a couple of those guys. But at this point, I don't know. TBD, we'll see a full breakup with Trump is hard to see. But like, Elon, you know, just looking into little box, finding something fun and popping out at three in the morning, he's tweeting at all hours. So all it takes is just like one minute where he's like fuck you You fucking little or tiny-fingered Bulgarian and like or you know, this is Peter ritardo

It comes up with one of those for Trump that could happen I think yeah, well know that like they've formally broken up when Trump says I've never met the guy. I don't Know we know it's over. Low-level intern. Yeah. Thank you so much for the rapid response. You're reporting for the Hill, Joe. Thank you for your chuckles and an insightful commentary, Sam Stein. Everybody else, we'll see you back here soon. Peace.