Lawrence: Elon Musk is the biggest loser in Donald Trump's world war on economic sanity

The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell

NBC News

Policy, Msnbc, Politics, President, Washington, Congress, Government, Senate, News

4.4 • 5.9K Ratings

🗓️ 8 April 2025

⏱️ 40 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Tonight on The Last Word: Elon Musk speaks out against Trump tariffs. Also, fired Justice Department attorneys speak out against the Trump administration. Plus, “Hands Off” protests demand action against the Trump agenda. And the Supreme Court pauses the deadline to return a man mistakenly deported to El Salvador. Catherine Rampell, Sen. Adam Schiff, Rep. Maxwell Frost, and Andrew Weissmann join Lawrence O’Donnell.

Transcript

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0:00.0	And so, as the 77th day of the second Trump presidency comes to a close, we have arrived at a moment that we knew was coming.
0:11.4	At some point, it had to come.
0:13.4	We have arrived at the Musk versus Trump moment.
0:18.8	The world has been wondering how long the bromance could last between the two most
0:24.4	volatile and publicly irrational men in the world, Elon Musk and Donald Trump. Donald Trump is
0:30.3	the only president in history who hired multiple White House chiefs of staff sequentially, only to end up
0:36.8	calling each of them an idiot before
0:40.4	and after he fired them. Donald Trump's first secretary of state called Donald Trump an
0:46.4	effing moron. It was documented, well documented by Bob Woodward and others, said that after
0:53.3	Donald Trump left a meeting.
0:55.3	And not long after that, Trump's first Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, was publicly being
1:00.4	attacked by Donald Trump after Donald Trump fired him. The publicly much-anticipated breakup
1:06.6	of Donald Trump and Elon Musk seems to center on the question of when would Donald Trump
1:14.9	turn on Elon Musk? That's what everyone was speculating about because Donald Trump has turned
1:19.1	on virtually everyone who's worked for him in the White House. But Elon Musk is the richest
1:23.8	person in the world. And there is no one Donald Trump wants to keep in his life more than the richest person in the world, which is why Donald Trump was willing to suffer the public humiliation of Elon Musk publicly taking over a discussion in the Oval Office about Elon Musk's governing policies that left the actual president of the United States having about the same amount
1:45.3	to say as Elon Musk's four-year-old son. We know Donald Trump doesn't ever want to turn against
1:53.0	Elon Musk because he never wants to lose access to Elon Musk's money and the fear that that money
2:00.5	creates, especially in the Republican Party,
2:03.1	as long as Donald Trump has Elon Musk's at his side, he can threaten any Republican member of
2:09.3	any Republican member of Congress with an Elon Musk financed campaign against that Republican
2:16.4	and the next Republican primary election. And so it has always made
	...

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