Elon Musk launched his most scathing criticism to yet on Tuesday of President Donald Trump’s massive tax and spending plan that is now pending in Congress. He backed Republican fiscal hawks who argue that the bill would increase the national debt and do little to control government spending.
In a post on X Tuesday, the CEO of Tesla (TSLA) declared, “I’m sorry, but I just can’t stand it anymore.” “This massive, outrageous, pork-filled congressional spending bill is a disgusting abomination.”
In a subsequent piece, he said that the bill “will massively increase the already giant budget deficit… and burden American citizens with crushingly unsustainable debt.”
Musk’s interpretation of the bill is supported by nonpartisan analysts. Despite making large savings to expected Medicaid spending, the House version of the measure, which was enacted last month, would increase the national debt by $3 trillion to $5 trillion over a ten-year period, according to the independent Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.
And that’s before the Senate makes changes to the bill. According to analysts, the Senate will likely reduce Medicaid cuts and clean-energy tax credit revisions, which make up the majority of the House version’s expenditure cuts.
Musk’s remarks support a tiny number of Senate fiscal hawks who claim the bill doesn’t slash spending enough and have threatened to vote it down unless major modifications are made.
This group has been led in the Senate by Republican Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, who has claimed that Republicans are not serious about spending cuts because the measure has a clause that lifts the debt ceiling by $5 trillion.
Paul also expressed worries about interest payments taking up a greater portion of the government budget, claiming that despite rising bond yields, the U.S. is “having trouble selling the 10-year bond” BX:TMUBMUSD10Y due to fiscal irresponsibility.
Other Senate Republicans who have expressed worries about the absence of expenditure cutbacks are Senators Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, Rick Scott of Florida, and Mike Lee of Utah. Assuming unified Democratic opposition, the bill would be defeated if the four of them remained together.
In an interview with CNBC on Tuesday, Paul stated, “I think there are three or four of us” who are determined to wait for more significant expenditure cutbacks. “It takes four people with courage, and four people with courage can make the bill into anything we wanted to right now.”
Despite Musk’s loud voice and the Senate’s fiscal hawks’ remarks, analysts predict that the bill will pass before the end of September, if not before.
One reason is that the Trump administration predicts that sometime in August, when Congress is supposed to be on recess, the U.S. government would run out of money to meet its obligations.
The tax measure raises the debt ceiling, allowing Treasury to borrow money to pay for everything from bond interest to older citizens’ Social Security benefits.
Republicans will have to quickly engage with Democrats if they are unable to agree on a plan that raises the debt ceiling, and they will probably have to make compromises that are even more repugnant to fiscal hawks than the present version of the Trump package.
Musk’s remarks have already been retaliated upon by the Trump administration and its congressional allies.
“The president already knows where Elon Musk stood on this bill,” White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt stated during a press briefing on Tuesday. “The president’s viewpoint is unchanged. He’s sticking to it, and this is one enormous, gorgeous bill.”
Republican Louisiana House Speaker Mike Johnson similarly criticized Musk’s criticism, telling reporters Tuesday that Musk’s remarks “are very disappointing” and that “my friend Elon is terribly wrong.”
Johnson claimed that Musk “seemed to understand” the benefits of the law when he discussed it with him on Monday.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, a Republican from South Dakota, must balance the interests of his caucus’s fiscal hawks and moderates.
Analysts at Beacon Policy Advisors wrote in a client note on Monday that “it’s likely that most, if not all, of the fiscal hawks other than Paul will fall in line if Thune is able to preserve the roughly $1.5 trillion in spending cuts offered by the House or even get closer to his own $2 trillion target.”
