Ex-Vice President Kamala Harris criticized billionaire Elon Musk and compared the Trump administration’s “America First” approach to the isolationist policies of the 1930s, which many historians argue contributed to the escalation of World War II.
In an address at the 2025 Australian Real Estate Conference on the Gold Coast, the former Democratic presidential hopeful referenced an interview Musk had with renowned podcaster Joe Rogan—where the billionaire cautioned about the weaponization of Western empathy.
“A certain individual who is quite prominent in the media today suggested that empathy is a sign of weakness in Western societies,” Harris, 60, remarked during her conversation with Australian real estate magnate John McGrath.
“Imagine,” she continued. “No, it’s a sign of strength to have some level of curiosity and concern and care about the well-being of others.”
During his March interview with Rogan, the Tesla founder emphasized that “you should care about other people,” but argued, “we’ve got civilizational suicidal empathy going on.”
“The fundamental weakness of Western civilization is empathy, the empathy exploit,” Musk contended. “They’re exploiting a bug in Western civilization, which is the empathy response.”
Harris also appeared to lament President Trump’s foreign policy approach, without mentioning him or any of his top officials by name.
“I do worry, frankly, about what’s happening in the world right now,” the former vice president admitted.
“It’s important that we remember the 1930s,” she went on.
“It’s important that we remember that history has taught us that isolation does not equal insulation [and] the importance of relationships of trust, of the importance of friendships, integrity, honesty.”
The former vice president refrained from bashing any of Trump’s policies specifically, but the comments broadly took issue with his “America First” approach to foreign affairs.
Despite her crushing defeat last year, Harris had vowed not to be quiet during Trump’s second term in the White House.
Last month, she emerged from weeks of laying low and delivered a stern rebuke of her rival while speaking at Emerge’s 20th anniversary gala in San Francisco.
She lambasted the commander in chief for creating “the greatest manmade economic crisis in modern presidential history” and engaging in a “wholesale abandonment” of American ideals.
Harris is currently thought to be mulling her political future, including whether or not she should vie to be governor of California in 2026, run for the presidency again in 2028, or stay on the sidelines.
“I am unemployed right now,” she joked earlier at the 2025 Australian Real Estate Conference.
