Tech billionaire Elon Musk is already flexing his newfound political muscle even before his ally President-elect Donald Trump has taken the oath of office.
Musk helped lead a revolt Wednesday to try to stop a bipartisan funding bill in a direct challenge to the authority of House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., and others in Republican leadership who helped craft the measure. And in a remarkable turn, the revolt appeared to succeed at least for a day, throwing budget negotiations into chaos and increasing the odds of a government shutdown this weekend.
“Yes,” House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., confirmed to reporters Wednesday evening when he was asked whether the current bill is now dead.
Musk posted to X about the funding bill more than 100 times over the course of the day. He repeatedly called the bill “criminal” and asked his followers to call their representatives, but he also posted memes, including one of him taking a sword to the bill and another referring to the “Kill Bill” films from director Quentin Tarantino. Later in the day, the phrase “Kill Bill” was on X’s list of trending topics in the United States.
Musk also issued a midday warning: “Any member of the House or Senate who votes for this outrageous spending bill deserves to be voted out in 2 years!” And when The Hill newspaper ran a story on its website about the warning, Musk emphasized his point by approvingly posting a screenshot of the headline.
Some of Musk’s posts were inaccurate. He said a proposed congressional pay raise would be 40%, while the maximum potential pay increase in 2025 has already been set at 3.8%, according to the Congressional Research Service. He also said the bill was “funding bioweapon labs,” citing a screenshot from the text of the bill related to “biocontainment laboratories” to better prepare the U.S. to combat infectious diseases.
And he reposted a false post alleging the bill includes $3 billion for a new NFL stadium in Washington, D.C., saying it “should not be funded by your tax dollars.” It isn’t. The bill transfers jurisdiction of RFK Stadium from the federal government to the capital city, which local leaders have been pushing to redevelop for the Washington Commanders, who play in Maryland. The bill would provide no money related to the site, and it would explicitly ban the use of any federal funds for a stadium there and require the district to pay for any costs related to the transfer.
His successful lobbying effort prompted Democrats to offer new nicknames for Musk, including “shadow president” and “co-president.”
Musk announced his opposition to the bill at 4:15 a.m. ET Wednesday.
“This bill should not pass,” he said on X.
The statement put Musk out on a limb as one of the first political figures to come out against the bill, but 13 hours later Trump himself spoke out in agreement. What happened in between was a furious online campaign directed by Musk to try to kill the bill, which he said was “criminal” because of its 1,547-page length and how much money it would spend.
The measure would have kept the government funded through mid-March. A shutdown is expected to begin at 12:01 a.m. Saturday without action from Congress.
Musk has never held political office and had barely voted until recently, but his influence is growing because of the combination of his massive wealth, his online celebrity, his ownership of X and his monetary and personal support this fall for Trump’s political comeback.
Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, of New Hampshire, was one of several Democrats questioning whether Trump was getting rolled by Musk.
“You have to ask Donald Trump — if Elon Musk is making the decisions,” Shaheen said Wednesday.
A Trump transition team official, asked why Trump waited to announce his opposition until hours after Musk and others had criticized the bill, said: “He let everyone wonder what he wanted to do. All eyes were on him. When he moved, it was over. He’s president before becoming president.”
President Joe Biden’s term ends Jan. 20.
Musk’s position in the Trump administration will be as a nongovernmental adviser through his co-lead of a government efficiency commission, so his actual authority is more difficult to measure than that of a Cabinet secretary or a full-time White House staffer.
Musk did not immediately respond to a request for comment, including about whether he plans to play a similar role in more legislative debates next year.
Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., said on X: “Democrats and Republicans spent months negotiating a bipartisan agreement to fund our government. The richest man on Earth, President Elon Musk, doesn’t like it. Will Republicans kiss the ring? Billionaires must not be allowed to run our government.”
Musk, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, spent more than $250 million this year to boost Trump and other Republicans in the Nov. 5 election. Since then, his own wealth has soared to more than $450 billion, making him the wealthiest person on the planet, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. SpaceX is a major government contractor.
On the social media app Bluesky, Rep. Maxwell Frost, D-Fla., said: “Republican Unelected Co-President Elon Musk has killed the bill to keep the government from shutting down on Friday. All he had to do was make a few social media posts.”
Musk appeared to acknowledge his influence, replying with a “saluting face” emoji to a compliment on X that touted his power.
Several Republican lawmakers said they were happy Musk intervened, but they stopped short of giving him all the credit or blame for the failure of the budget negotiations.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., said: “Elon put out a pretty serious post there. But you know, that’s the sentiment of the American people. This is why we won on Nov. 5. Everyone is sick and tired of overspending.”
Sen. Ted Budd, R-N.C., asked about Musk’s comments on the bill, said: “He’s very influential.”
At least one conservative lawmaker, Rep. Tim Burchett, R-Tenn., declined to give Musk credit. He said he opposed the funding bill before Musk did.
“I appreciate Elon Musk following my lead,” Burchett said on CNN.
Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., said Musk was tapping into or reflecting “a lot of anger out there.”
A Senate Republican aide, who was granted anonymity to speak candidly, said that Musk’s role was not decisive and that it risked a backlash. “I think the CR was already cooked without Elon, but I wouldn’t be thrilled with him playing this role if I were Trump,” the aide said, using the initialism for a “continuing resolution.”
There was no guarantee that Musk’s opposition would succeed. When he announced his opposition, the betting website Polymarket gave a 12% chance of a government shutdown this weekend. Throughout the day, amid Musk’s flurry of tweets, the odds rose to 40%.
Many of his posts on X got tens of millions of views, according to the app’s publicly visible data. His initial announcement opposing the bill was seen 32 million times, and a post with a photo of the bill asking, “Ever seen a bigger piece of pork?” was seen 27 million times.
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
