Just to preface all of this: President Donald Trump has easily been the best president this country has had in the 21st century, and a candidate that most supporters would be proud to have supported in all three of his general elections.
That does not mean, however, that the president is above reproach.
And few things have crystallized that better than his on-again–off-again friendship with former Department of Government Efficiency head Elon Musk, a noted and vocal critic of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.
(To say nothing of Trump’s general aversion to fiscal budget hawks — sorry, but this country’s crippling debt problem is a real issue.)
Now, to be clear, this is not meant as some lionization of Musk. The man’s far from flawless and certainly not faultless in this feud with Trump.
But this isn’t about the messenger so much as it is about the message, which is what made the president’s recent jab at Musk all the more dismaying.
Speaking to reporters Tuesday, Trump was asked about Musk’s renewed push to speak out against the OBBB.
Check out his response to one question, in particular:
🔥🔥 Reporter: Are you going to deport Elon Musk?
Trump: We’ll have to take a look. We might have to put DOGE on Elon. You know what DOGE is, the monster that might have to go back and eat Elon, wouldn’t that be terrible. He gets a lot of subsidies. pic.twitter.com/CwIHLykUab
— Breaking911 (@Breaking911) July 1, 2025
Did Trump go too far by suggesting Elon Musk could be deported?
“Are you going to deport Elon Musk?” one intrepid reporter asked the president.
The president, seemingly taken aback at the severity of that question, answered, “I don’t know. I mean, we’ll have to take a look. We might have to put DOGE on Elon.”
“You know what DOGE is?” Trump continued. “DOGE is the monster that might have to go back and eat Elon. Wouldn’t that be terrible?”
Look, was Trump embellishing or joking here? Probably so, not that that’d stop the establishment media from breathlessly covering it.
(Though, it probably bears noting that Musk — who owns electric vehicle company Tesla — has repeatedly denied the president’s claims that he’s opposed to the spending bill due to EV subsidy cuts.)
But it still can’t be stressed enough: Musk has every right to do what he’s doing, raising fiscally conservative questions about what and how the OBBB will impact America’s out-of-control debt problem.
That being said, even if Musk was raising far-left communist questions, he is well within his rights to do so as an American citizen — without threat of deportation.
Look, I’m also not saying Trump did anything especially egregious here, apart from the deportation comment. There’s no reason to overreact to that quip. He and many of his supporters genuinely believe the OBBB is a key piece of legislation that can help turn this country around. Given that, they can and should vigorously defend the Congressional spending bill.
But threatening deportation against reasonable and thoughtful criticisms simply isn’t helpful to anyone.
Agreeing with a president’s policy bills has not ever been a prerequisite for citizenship in America — something Musk has enjoyed since 2002.
Whatever one may think of the polarizing Congressional spending bill, we should all be able to agree with that.
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