Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent took a jab at tech magnate Elon Musk on Sunday, critiquing Musk’s effort to establish a new political party. Bessent suggested that Musk doesn’t have the widespread appeal necessary to succeed in this political venture.
On Saturday, Musk officially unveiled his intention to form the America Party, following disagreements with President Trump and Republicans over the legislation known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. The wealthy entrepreneur behind Tesla and Space X hinted that his party’s focus will be on a limited number of highly competitive electoral contests.
“Look, the principles of DOGE were very popular. I think if you looked at the polling, Elon was not,” Bessent told CNN’s “State of the Union.”
Previously, Musk played a key role in the Trump administration’s initiative to create the Department of Government Efficiency. He served as a special government employee until May but eventually had a notable falling out with the president.
The billionaire guru has lamented that DOGE became a “whipping boy for everything.” More recently, he fussed that the debt impact of Trump’s megabill makes a “mockery of the work” done by his DOGE team to slash the deficit.
Bessent and Musk have had beef in the past.
After Trump’s 2024 presidential victory, Musk publicly backed then-Cantor Fitzgerald CEO Howard Lutnick to helm the Treasury Department over Bessent. Trump ultimately went with Bessent and made Lutnick the secretary of the Department of Commerce.
In April, Musk and Bessent also got into a heated shouting match after meeting with Trump. MAGA podcaster Steve Bannon alleges Musk then body-checked Bessent — something which the Treasury secretary hasn’t publicly confirmed.
Despite their acrimonious relationship, Bessent had previously downplayed friction with Musk, telling The Post’s “Pod Force One” podcast that he’s more “ninja”-like while Musk “fancies himself more of a Viking.”
“I believe that the boards of directors at his various companies wanted him to come back and run those companies, which he is better at than anyone,” Bessent said on CNN.
“So I imagine that those board of directors did not like this [new political party] announcement yesterday and will be encouraging him to focus on his business activities, not his political activities,” the Trump official said.
Trump has been somewhat restrained in his response to Musk’s broadsides, though he has occasionally threatened to yank subsidies away from his former buddy’s companies — and at one point said he would look into trying to deport the South African native.
Musk has publicly claimed that his chief grievance with the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which Trump signed into law Friday, is that it is expected to blow up the deficit. The megabill is set to add $3.9 trillion to the nation’s debt over the next 10 years, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.
Trump and GOP leaders have speculated that Musk’s public crusade against the megabill was motivated by the gutting of Biden-era green energy subsidies — something Musk has also complained about publicly but denied was his top concern.
The world’s richest man announced his newly minted America Party after openly toying with the concept and conducting an X poll to gauge support.
Musk’s team has since filed paperwork with the Federal Election Commission for the new party.
“The way we’re going to crack the uniparty system is by using a variant of how Epaminondas shattered the myth of Spartan invincibility at Leuctra: Extremely concentrated force at a precise location on the battlefield,” the tech billionaire explained.
Musk had previously indicated that he would target just a few key Senate and House races in order to influence the balance of power in Congress.
