President Donald Trump attempted to dispel reporting that he doesn't want federal government agencies to contract with Elon Musk's companies.
A reporter asked White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt on Wednesday whether the president supported federal contracts going to Musk's xAI, and she said, "I don't think so, no." But Trump disputed that the following day on his Truth Social website.
"Everyone is stating that I will destroy Elon’s companies by taking away some, if not all, of the large-scale subsidies he receives from the U.S. Government," Trump posted Thursday morning. "This is not so! I want Elon, and all businesses within our Country, to THRIVE, in fact, THRIVE like never before! The better they do, the better the USA does, and that’s good for all of us. We are setting records every day, and I want to keep it that way!"
Musk's artificial intelligence company xAI recently announced $200 million contracts with the Department of Defense, about a week after its chatbot Grok spewed antisemitic hate speech and praised Adolf Hitler.
Trump and Musk descended into a bitter feud after the tech CEO left his advisory role in the White House at the end of May. The mogul helped kick off the extended Jeffrey Epstein saga by tweeting that the president's name was included in the sex offender's case files.
The president reportedly tried to cut ties with Musk's SpaceX company after the CEO criticized the "big, beautiful bill" that Republicans eventually passed and Trump signed into law.