Jabs fly as Musk and Trump step into the ring, here's how the feud unfolded

The feud between Elon Musk and Donald Trump began with the former criticising 'Big Beautiful Bill' in a recent interview

US President Donald Trump and tech billionaire Elon Musk, who were once the closest allies, are now publicly trading barbs at each other. After staying silent on Musk’s criticism of the ‘Big Beautiful Bill’, Trump has now responded, while addressing the reporters in the Oval Office on Thursday (local time). 

Here is a look at how the feud between Trump and Musk unfolded: 

The feud between Elon Musk and Donald Trump began with the former criticising ‘Big Beautiful Bill’ in an interview with CBS. Musk’s critique of the bill came a day before he exited DOGE. Even though Musk did not explicitly target Trump, in a post on X, he wrote, “Shame on those who voted for it”, referring to the Congress members who voted in favour of the tax cut bill.

 

 

While Trump remained silent for days, things changed after he answered questions at the Oval Office. He responded by saying, “And you know Elon’s upset because we took the EV mandate, which was a lot of money for electric vehicles. And they’re having a hard time, the electric vehicles. And they want us to pay billions of dollars in subsidies. Elon knew this from the beginning; he knew it a long time ago.”

 

“He knew every aspect of this bill — better than almost anybody, and he never had a problem until right after he left. He said the most beautiful things about me. He hasn’t said bad things about me personally, but I’m sure that’ll be next. But I’m very disappointed in Elon. I’ve helped Elon a lot.”

 

“People leave my administration, and they love us, and then at some point they miss it so badly, and some of them embrace it, and some of them actually become hostile. I don’t know what it is. It’s sort of Trump derangement syndrome, I guess they call it, but we have it with others, too. They leave and they wake up in the morning, and the glamour’s gone. The whole world is different, and they become hostile,” he said. 

Following Trump’s remarks, Musk took to X and started responding in real time to what the US president said during his press conference. He wrote, "False, this bill was never shown to me even once and was passed in the dead of night so fast that almost no one in Congress could even read it!” 

His next tweets were directed at Trump, moving beyond the bill, in which he claimed that Trump would have lost the election without him.

 

Musk also put up a poll on X, asking his followers about the formation of a new political party "that actually represents the 80 per cent in the middle." 

He then gave a new name for Trump's 'Big Beautiful Bill', calling it the "Big Ugly Spending Bill", adding that even those who voted for this bill had the time to read about it. 

Trump then responded to Musk's tweet by taking to Truth Social. Sharing two posts on his private social media platform, Trump wrote, "Elon was 'wearing thin,' I asked him to leave, I took away his EV Mandate that forced everyone to buy Electric Cars that nobody else wanted (that he knew for months I was going to do!), and he just went CRAZY" 

"The easiest way to save money in our Budget, Billions and Billions of Dollars, is to terminate Elon's Governmental Subsidies and Contracts. I was always surprised that Biden didn't do it!" 

Responding to Trump's accusation regarding the EV mandate, Musk called it an "obvious lie". He then dared Trump to cancel government contracts with his companies. 

The social media bashing continued with Musk accusing Trump of being in "the Epstein files", adding that this is the reason that they have not been released. 

In an attempt to defend his tax cut bill, Trump posted on Truth Social and wrote, "I don't mind Elon turning against me, but he should have done so months ago. This is one of the Greatest Bills ever presented to Congress." 

"It's a Record Cut in Expenses, $1.6 Trillion, and the Biggest Tax Cut ever given. If this Bill doesn't pass, there will be a 68% Tax Increase, and things far worse than that. I didn't create this mess, I'm just here to FIX IT." 

In yet another series of tweets, Musk then announced that SpaceX's Dragon spacecraft will decommission immediately. The Dragon spacecraft is responsible for transporting astronauts to the International Space Station. He claimed that the decommissioning is in light of Trump's warning of cancelling government contracts. 

Musk then criticised Trump's reciprocal tariffs, claiming that they would lead to a recession in the US in the second half of the year. 

Tesla chief Musk then shared a video of Trump partying with Epstein from the 1990s, providing a piece of evidence for his earlier claim about the Epstein files.