Trump Jabs Elon Over Those Pesky ‘President Musk’ Claims: ‘I’m Safe’

Donald Trump made clear on Sunday: Elon Musk may be the world’s richest man, but he’s never going to be its most powerful politician.

“No, he’s not gonna be president, that I can tell you,” the president-elect told a crowd in Arizona. “And I’m safe, you know why? He can’t be, he wasn’t born in this country.”

Trump added an explicit “ha ha ha” after his comment and raised his arms, which elicited applause from the conservative crowd at TPUSA’s AmericaFest conference.

That marked the first time Trump directly addressed Democrats’ latest attack line that Musk—or, “President Musk,” as he’s been nicknamed—has usurped Trump’s power a month before inauguration day.

Musk’s new moniker emerged this week after he took a hard-line stance against a stopgap government funding bill he felt had too wide of a scope. Musk made his opposition public hours before Trump followed suit, with a number of lawmakers pulling their support for the bill off of Musk’s threats alone.

The bill was killed entirely after Trump chimed in with the same criticisms as his billionaire buddy. The move threatened to shut the federal government down just days before Christmas, but the crisis was averted with the passing of a new budget on Friday.

The “President Musk” nickname has stuck, however, highlighting just how much sway Musk now holds in contemporary GOP politics.

Democrats have since used Musk’s influence as a way to mock Trump, who is widely known to hate playing second fiddle.

Rep. Greg Casar (D-TX) pondered this week if Musk was “kind of cosplaying co-president here,” adding, “I don’t know why Trump doesn’t just hand him the Oval Office.”

Rep. Brendan Boyle (D-PA) also declared that “the leader of the GOP is Elon Musk.”

While Musk is constitutionally barred from being president because he was born in South Africa, as Trump reminded everyone on Sunday, he’s enjoyed an outsized role in the soon-to-be-president’s inner circle.

In recent months, he’s been permitted to listen in on calls with foreign leaders and to jet around the country to events of all types alongside Trump.

Musk’s rising political power culminated with Trump’s decision to address—and partially dismiss—his pal’s growing power on stage this weekend, albeit doing so after he showered Musk with praise for his contributions to him and the country.

“We will create the new Department of Government Efficiency, headed by Elon Musk,” Trump said to cheers on Sunday. “And no, he’s not taking the presidency...They’re on a new kick, Russia, Russia, Russia, Ukraine, Ukraine, Ukraine, all the different hoaxes. The new one is, President Trump has ceded the presidency to Elon Musk. No, no, that’s not happening.”