The billionaire tech entrepreneur Elon Musk on Saturday criticized the latest version of Donald Trump’s sprawling tax and spending bill, calling it “utterly insane and destructive.
“The latest Senate draft bill will destroy millions of jobs in America and cause immense strategic harm to our country!” Musk wrote on Saturday as the Senate was scheduled to call a vote to open debate on the nearly 1,000-page bill.
“Utterly insane and destructive,” Musk added. “It gives handouts to industries of the past while severely damaging industries of the future.”
Passing the package, Musk said, would be “political suicide for the Republican Party.”
Musk’s comment reopens a recent fiery conflict between the former head of the Department of Government Efficiency (Doge) and the administration he recently left. They also represent yet another headache for Republican Senate leaders who have spent the weekend working overtime to get the legislation through their chamber so it can pass by Trump’s Fourth of July deadline.
Earlier this month, the Tesla and SpaceX CEO also came out against the House version of Trump’s “big, beautiful bill”, denouncing that proposal as a “disgusting abomination”.
“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 wrote at the time.
Musk’s forceful denouncement of Trump’s spending plans triggered a deep and public rift between the billionaire and the president, though Musk in recent weeks has been working to mend relations.
On Saturday, Musk posted a series of disparaging comments about the senate version of the bill, which argued the legislation would undermine US investments in renewable energy.
Musk boosted several comments from Jesse Jenkins, a macro-scale energy systems engineer who teaches at Princeton.
After Jenkins wrote, “The energy provisions in the Republicans’ One Big Horrible Bill are truly so bad! Who wants this? The country’s automakers don’t want it. Electric utilities don’t want it. Data center developers don’t want it. Manufacturers in energy intensive industries don’t want it.” Musk replied: “Good question. Who?”
Musk’s continued criticism of Trump’s budget proposals comes as the bill faces a rocky path in the senate. Republicans are hoping to use their majorities to overcome Democratic opposition, but several Republican senators are concerned over provisions that would reduce spending on Medicaid and food stamps to help cover the cost of extending Trump’s tax breaks. Meanwhile, fiscal conservatives are worried about the nation’s debt are pushing for steeper cuts.
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