WASHINGTON — Elon Musk’s push to “kill” President Trump’s “big beautiful bill” isn’t likely to change a single vote in the Senate — and it’s not going to stop the passage of the tax-and-spending spending plan, Republican aides tell the Post.
In fact, the former “first buddy’s” spectacular falling out with the president Thursday afternoon could make it even harder for the Republican holdouts to push for bigger spending cuts — because Musk has become absolutely toxic with Trump loyalists.
“Until two days ago, Musk’s criticism of the bill gave Senate conservatives space to fight for improvements and deeper spending cuts in the BBB,” one GOP aide told The Post. “But nobody wants to kill the bill outright — it’s not going to happen.”
“The president supports this bill and this effort,” another added. “I don’t think this back and forth will have any substantive effect on Senate Republicans.”
A third offered that Musk was still “giving good cover to those who have already come out swinging against it.”
Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) declared Thursday that Musk was “on point” about the reconciliation bill’s budget-busting provisions.
“Last year in my Festivus Report, I exposed that in 2024 alone, Americans paid $892 [billion] in interest,” he posted on X. “That’s 10% of the entire federal budget—gone. Not for bridges, schools, or healthcare. Just to keep the creditors at bay.”
On Wednesday, fellow holdout Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) called the level of spending in the bill “grotesque” during an interview on CNBC’s “Squawk Box.”
“The president and Senate leadership has to understand that we’re serious. They all say, ‘Oh, we can pressure these guys.’ No, you can’t,” Johnson said. “I ran 2010 as part of the Tea Party Movement. We were mortgaging children’s future. We were $14 trillion in debt then now we’re over $37 trillion. We’re serious about this.”
Sens. Rick Scott (R-Fla.), Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) have also expressed reservations, though the latter two voiced concerns about Medicaid reforms in the House version.
The House-passed bill includes more than $1.5 trillion in spending reductions, a permanent extension of Trump’s 2017 tax cuts for individuals, hundreds of billions for border security and national defense as well as cutting green-energy tax credits approved in the last administration.
The Congressional Budget Office estimated that it will add $2.4 trillion to the deficit over the next decade.
The president unloaded on Musk in the Oval Office Thursday and said he had “Trump Derangement Syndrome” after serving just 130 days as a special government employee overseeing the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
“Elon and I had a great relationship. I don’t know if we will anymore,” Trump admitted.
The two escalated their social media feud Thursday afternoon, with the president even floating the elimination of the Tesla and SpaceX CEO’s government “subsidies and contracts.”
“Elon was ‘wearing thin,’ I asked him to leave, I took away his EV Mandate that forced everyone to buy Electric Cars that nobody else wanted (that he knew for months I was going to do!), and he just went CRAZY!” Trump erupted.
Musk shot back that the accusation was an “obvious lie” and went on a tweeting tirade against Trump, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) by digging up old posts of theirs expressing concern about the national debt.
Senate Republicans currently hold a 53-47 vote advantage over Democrats in the upper chamber, meaning they will have to flip a handful of holdouts in order to pass the reconciliation bill.
Because it’s a budget bill and cannot be filibustered, Republicans only need 50 votes for the legislation to pass.
