Trump Picks Sides in Elon Musk Feud—And It’s Not With the ‘First Buddy’

President-elect Donald Trump and Elon Musk pose for a photo during the UFC 309 event at Madison Square Garden on November 16, 2024 in New York City.
Jeff Bottari/Zuffa LLC

President Donald Trump has praised U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer, striking the complete opposite tone of his billionaire ally Elon Musk, who has called for the British leader’s ouster.

Speaking to reporters on board Air Force One on Saturday, Trump said the prime minister was “doing a very good job” and that the two have a “very good relationship.”

“I get along with him well,” he said of Starmer, who shared a two hour dinner with the president at Trump Tower in New York City in September. “I like him a lot. He’s liberal, which is a bit different from me, but I think he’s a very good person and I think he’s done a very good job thus far.”

Trump’s diplomatic tone is in stark contrast to his adviser and and self-proclaimed “first buddy” Musk, who has blasted Starmer over the U.K. grooming gangs scandal.

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In a series of posts on his social media platform X, Musk launched incendiary allegations against the U.K. leader, including that he was “deeply complicit in the mass rapes in exchange for votes.”

In addition to calling for Starmer’s ouster, the Tesla CEO said one of the UK leader’s cabinet ministers should be jailed.

Starmer accused Musk—a booster of the right wing populist Reform UK party—of spreading “lies and misinformation” and of amplifying far-right “poison.”

Starmer, who leads the centrist Labour Party, was elected Prime Minister in July after 14 years of Conservative Party rule.

Since taking office, he has taken increasingly fiscally conservative positions, earlier this month stating his government “will be ruthless” on making cuts to public services.

He and Trump spoke by phone after November election and Trump said they plant to speak again within the next few days.

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Last month, Starmer named Peter Mandelson—a longtime Labour politician who previously called Trump “little short of a white nationalist and racist”— as UK ambassador to the United States.

After the announcement, Trump’s co-campaign manager Chris LaCivita called Mandelson an “absolute moron.”

Trump plans to send Mark Burnett, the producer of his reality show The Apprentice, to London as American’s top envoy.