The hyped conversation between billionaires Trump and musk interview on Platform X began with massive technical problems – and then suffered from a complete lack of distance. The Republican made fun of the climate crisis. The entrepreneur begged for a position.
Trump and musk interview: A Conversation of 130 minutes on“X”
Washington. In the end, after three agonizingly long hours, at least two men were satisfied. “I want to congratulate you. “It’s impressive what you’ve achieved,” Donald Trump praised his host Elon Musk. And the second richest man in the world was also very impressed by how the evening went: “You can have a conversation like that with you. You couldn’t run it with Kamala Harris or Joe Biden.”
The listeners had to endure annoying elevator music for three quarters of an hour before Musk finally spoke up. Meanwhile, thousands tried in vain to join the discussion. You just received an error message. The X boss, who had experienced a similar disaster a year ago at the presentation of then presidential candidate Ron DeSantis, quickly blamed an alleged cyber attack.
Keyword giver instead of critical interviewer
When the technical problems were finally solved, around a million listeners tuned in. That’s around a third of the evening viewership of the right-wing channel Fox News and far from a record. It quickly became clear that Musk, who has transformed himself into an ultra-right-wing activist and is increasingly aggressively spreading alarmist messages and conspiracy myths, did not want to be a critical interviewer, but at best a cue for the ex-president. However, even this role clearly overwhelmed his rhetorical skills, which were expressed in stammering statements, uncritical acclamations (“Sure”, “Yeah”) and an unmotivated giggling laugh.
Musk was clearly very proud to have the Republican presidential candidate on his platform. And Trump didn’t hesitate for a minute to use the world’s largest megaphone for his own purposes. Right at the beginning, Musk gave him the opportunity to talk about the assassination attempt. And although the 78-year-old had declared at the Republican party conference just three weeks ago that he would only describe the incident once and then never again “because it was too painful”, he now spent half an hour laying out all the details of his heroic moment of the “miracle” that saved his life. Musk waved the verbal censer like an altar boy and assured: “Many people admire her courage.”
This was followed by a usual Trump and musk interview rally on inflation, migration and the alleged political persecution by the judiciary for a special listener. Without being questioned or even reprimanded by Musk, the politician was able to slander migrants across the board as “escaped prisoners,” “terrorists,” and “rapists.” He raved that Ukraine was “the apple of Putin’s eye” and attested to the world’s dictators that they were “at their best.” He made fun of the climate crisis by saying that sea level rise would soon lead to more coastal properties. Without being contradicted, he also spread his lie about election fraud and claimed that he was being prosecuted by the public prosecutor because he wanted to prevent the vote from being manipulated.
Trump’s voice sparks new rumors about his health
What was noticeable, of course, was Trump and musk interview strange voice, which sounded as if he had forgotten to use his teeth. He kept smudging out “sh” sounds, and “San Francisco” became “Than Franthisco.” Rumors about a health issue quickly spread online. But a defective microphone could also be responsible for the penetrating hissing noise.
Musk hopes for deregulation for Space X and Tesla
It was only later in the evening that one could guess what interests guided the entrepreneur in his support for Trump and musk interview. Not only is he hoping for new orders for his rocket company Space X and the satellite company Starlink if he wins the election. Official investigations into the harassment of employees at Space X are also likely to be discontinued. Above all, Musk expects regulatory relief for the autonomous driving of his Tesla cars.
A few times in the conversation he conspicuously tried to convey an idea to Trump. The country absolutely needs a commission to increase government efficiency, he repeated several times: “And I would like to work on that.” “I like that. “You’re an interesting character,” Trump and musk interview replied, before moving on to the next topic. Musk made a similarly striking plea for budget restructuring and deregulation. Of course, Trump appeared as uninterested in this as he was in a gentle reminder that carbon dioxide consumption cannot continue indefinitely. “I’m waiting for you to put solar panels on the roofs of your cars,” Trump joked.
This did not affect the togetherness of the two men, who have similar levels of self-confidence, PR greed and a penchant for counterfactual narratives. “It is important for the country that you win the election,” Trump and musk interview said goodbye to his guest. And Trump fantasized about a gigantic audience of “60 to 70 million people” for his conversation. Unfortunately, the X app shows exactly the number of people connected: there were 1.1 million.