It takes just a glance at history to recognize that the United States has never been a fair or equal nation. Many Americans have always known this. However, in the last few years, this has become painfully obvious to more Americans – that some of the loudest voices in politics are some of the wealthiest, greediest and cruelest. The clearest example of this is the second Donald Trump administration, an administration filled with the president’s bigoted best friends and some of the most privileged individuals in the world. Enter Elon Musk, the richest man on Earth and owner of Tesla, SpaceX, and X (formerly known as Twitter), and now, the overseer of the newly-minted Department of Government Efficiency in the second Trump administration.
According to Forbes, Musk is worth an estimated $427 billion and is projected to become the world’s first trillionaire as soon as 2027. His involvement in the Trump administration has sparked controversy as it is part of a larger continuity of incredibly rich people venturing into the world of politics. Trump himself has a net worth of over $6.8 billion. Musk isn’t the only billionaire cozying up to Trump, either. Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Facebook, and Jeff Bezos, the executive chairman and former CEO of Amazon – although not directly involved in the new administration – were also in attendance at Trump’s inauguration.
One student shared their perspective on Musk’s new political career.
“I feel like once people get that much money, they want to get more and more money and influence. I think most of Elon Musk’s ideas are not his own. I think he is tailoring his beliefs to voters, because until a few years ago, he was not this radical,” said Mahi Kohli (10).
Musk’s increasingly disturbing comments have been noticed by many. It feels like Musk’s only agenda is to line his pockets, to saunter around the world shaking hands with dictators and to feel powerful, all the while spewing hateful rhetoric to every marginalized group imaginable – undocumented immigrants, Black Americans, Jewish people, Palestinians, the LGBTQ+ community, and women. It seems that by befriending Trump, Musk and the world’s other billionaires have realized that pandering toward radical far-right groups helps them consolidate more power and influence, and that sadly, discrimination and dehumanizing minorities is a highly effective strategy to accomplish this.
This suspicion isn’t helped by his relentless perpetuating of conspiracies and embrace of radical and fascist rhetoric. At a post-inauguration celebration, Musk gave a speech, and in it, appeared to give a Nazi salute to the crowd and then to the American flag. The gesture was clearly visible, but many news outlets and individuals refused to call it what it was. Musk and Trump have both promoted Nazi rhetoric in the past, with Trump dehumanizing and vilifying Mexican immigrants and fueling the fire of white supremacy, and with Musk endorsing a far-right candidate in Germany’s federal election, but Musk’s recent salute was an explicit and overt embrace of it. Some feel that there is a sort of fatigue among people towards the actions of the Trump administration, and that there is a dismissal or excusal towards Musk’s increasingly harmful words and actions.
Another student shared their feelings about the dismissal they see of Musk’s actions.
“What really hurts the most is that people are excusing what he’s been doing because he has money and is in the government, and because he’s autistic. I know people who are autistic and that’s not an excuse. It also weirds me out how easily he was able to get into the government, because yes, we want a stable economy, but not a dictatorship,” said Maggie Punch (9).
