Donald Trump’s nominee for chief of staff worried that Elon Musk’s connection to the president-elect was bad news and she worked to keep the billionaire’s power under control, a columnist wrote Tuesday.
But Salon’s Amanda Marcotte wrote that Susie Wiles’ plot failed. And it now threatens to tear apart the GOP.
Marcotte wrote that “it’s a safe bet” that Wiles created the Department of Government Efficiency as a way to contain Musk — putting him in a “presidential advisory committee” with no real power.
She knew, Marcotte believes, that Musk’s massive wealth and influence made him a threat to Trump’s presidency — and she wanted to nip it in the bud by giving him a prestigious spot with no real authority.
“Alas for her, Musk has Twitter and he uses it the same way Trump did in his first term, to rile up supporters and create so much noise that those who are putting the leader on "ignore" are forced to kowtow to whims frequently spouted in the hours when more sober people are sleeping,” Marcotte wrote.
“Musk is doing what he became unbelievably wealthy doing: stealing other people's ideas and passing them off as his own. In this case, he's swiping Trump's strategy of using Twitter mobbing tactics to work around the bureaucratic obstacles.”
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Marcotte wrote that Musk used this tactic during the spending bill votes last week, effectively brow-beating Republicans to do his will.
“While it didn't work this time, in terms of actually stopping the bill, it's hard to ignore that Republicans, having spent years kowtowing to Trump's narcissism, are turning their practice towards lavish public obsequiousness to Musk,” she wrote.
The message the columnist gave to Trump is that, despite him saying at the weekend that he is the president and not Musk, the world's richest man wields real power — and he will use it.
“No telling how this all plays out, except that it will be chaotic. Despite Trump's victory in November, there have been strong signs for months that his cult-like grip on his followers is loosening,” she wrote.
“... One gets the strong impression that the MAGA masses are interested in a younger, more dynamic leader.
“... The silver lining in all of this is that Trump and Musk are both mean-spirited narcissists. They'll struggle to avoid conflict if pitted in a 'who's more powerful' contest. Such a fight can only demobilize the GOP base as people take sides in this increasingly ugly fight.”