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Much of Musk's influence comes from his unique ability to fire up the Republican base on social media.
As Elon Musk unleashed a flurry of tweets on his X platform, demanding that Republicans back out of a deal to avoid a government shutdown, Donald Trump remained publicly silent.
Instead, the president-elect gathered in his office Wednesday in a ballroom at Mar-a-Lago.
As Musk teased the MAGA measures, Trump was having a series of conversations with top aides, including Susie Wiles and Stephen Miller, as Vice President-elect JD Vance privately voiced Trump's concerns about a bill on Capitol Hill, according to two people who have been granted anonymity to discuss the matter freely.
By the time Trump and Vance finally came out hours later in a joint statement, the bill was already vetoed and the future of Capitol Hill Speaker Mike Johnson was in jeopardy.
The sequence highlighted the developing dynamic between high-profile philanthropist-turned-advisor Musk and Trump. This raised a difficult question for Trump about whether he or Musk were running America. As Republican lawmakers on Thursday floated the possibility of installing the billionaire businessman as speaker of Congress, and Democrats mocked Trump by claiming that Musk was the real leader of the Republican Party, Trump held a round of interviews with reporters apparently to ensure they knew it was his idea to kill the bill that requires bipartisan funding.
In phone interviews with reporters on ABC, CBS and NBC, Trump also called for the debt ceiling to be eliminated or extended and stressed that if the government shuts down, it will, in effect, "be a Biden shutdown."
Trump aides and allies insisted that Musk was acting at the direction of the president-elect.
Musk is "a piece on Trump's chessboard, like everyone else," said one person close to Trump, who, like others in this story, was granted anonymity to speak candidly. The media "really wants to paint Elon as an independent character. If it was a chessboard, [Musk] would be an officer.”
But the fact that Trump's spokesman felt it necessary to issue a statement about who was running the Republican Party showed the extent to which the confusion has reached, even among some Republicans and close Trump allies.
“As soon as President Trump released his official position, Republicans on Capitol Hill echoed his view. President Trump is the leader of the Republican Party. It's over," said Karoline Leavitt, Trump's incoming White House press secretary, in response to Democrats' taunts that Musk was actually the boss.
Musk's involvement in Congress raised questions about whether he was simply beginning his cost-cutting duties as head of the newly announced Department of Government Efficiency with Trump's blessing, or working independently.
Congress leader Johnson told Fox News on Wednesday morning that he spent the evening exchanging messages with Musk and his DOGE partner Vivek Ramaswamy about the proposed bill.
But a person close to Trump says something else.
"Here's the question: Is Elon Musk saying to the president, 'Hey, I'm going to do this.' And the president says, 'Great, you be the bad guy.' Or is Musk just doing this without asking? And the president says, 'Oh, shit,'" said a person close to Trump.
"Elon knows a lot about launching rockets into space. But what does he know about the details of political deals, right? And what is needed to pass laws" - he added.
Those extremely narrow margins left Speaker Mike Johnson scrambling to craft an interim bill that both Democrats and Republicans could accept, even though it went far beyond what the Trump team had made clear. that the newly elected president would support him.
If there was any friction between Trump and Musk, it wasn't immediately apparent. On Wednesday night, Musk joined Trump at a dinner with Amazon founder Jeff Bezos on the patio of Mar-a-Lago.
"The most influential person in the Republican Party is Donald Trump. But the second most is Elon Musk. He has the attention of many members," said one Republican congressman, who spoke on condition of anonymity to speak freely.
Much of Musk's influence comes from his unique ability to fire up the Republican base on social media. A former Republican congressman said Musk's power cannot be underestimated. The former lawmaker suggested that members of the Republican Party should be aware of his ability to create a backlash online and take seriously his threat to fund challenges against them.
"No one wants to run into him," the former lawmaker said, adding that it would be foolish to expect anyone with the courage to come forward, given that most of the more independent lawmakers have already left.
Some conservative and Republican allies close to Trump, such as Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, even suggested that Johnson be replaced by Musk.
"I would be open to supporting @elonmusk for Speaker of Congress," Greene tweeted. "The institution must be destroyed as it was destroyed yesterday."
"24 hours of chaos," the negotiations on Capitol Hill warned, resulted in a Republican plan that both Trump and Musk endorsed.
"SUCCESS in Washington! "President Mike Johnson and the House have reached a very good deal for the American people," Trump declared in X.
Musk retweeted Trump's statement and later clarified that he had nothing to do with the new deal.
"I am not the author of this proposal. Credit to DonaldTrump, JDVance and SpeakerJohnson," wrote Musk./ Politico.eu
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