Mr. Musk, the world’s richest man and CEO of Tesla and X, praised the former president following the July murder attempt. On Saturday, he returned to the location and delivered an enthusiastic rally speech.
Elon Musk, the millionaire CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, stepped onto the stage to cheers at Donald J. Trump’s event on Saturday night, raised his arms above his head and jumped into the air twice, exposing his navel as his shirt rolled up.
He wore a “Occupy Mars” shirt under a sport coat and nodded to his black “Make America Great Again” baseball cap.
“As you can see, I’m not just MAGA, I’m dark MAGA,” he told me.
Mr. Musk publicly endorses Mr. Trump posted on X, the social media network he controls, just after a shooter attempted to kill the former president on July 13 in Butler, Pa. So, when Mr. Trump returned Saturday to hold a rally at the same location where he was attacked, he invited Mr. Musk along.
In addition to hopping up and down onstage, he urged the audience to chant “Fight! Fight! Fight!” β an echo of Mr. Trump’s statements following the attack.
The crowd recognised Mr. Musk, who was presented by the previous president to cheers. Mr. Trump praised Mr. Musk, the world’s richest guy, for founding an American automobile firm and preserving “free speech” through X.
βPresident Trump We must win to preserve the Constitution,” Mr. Musk said, jumping to the microphone with his palms in the air. “He must win to preserve democracy in America.”
While Mr. Musk routinely tweets about Mr. Trump on X, his speech on Saturday was his first at a rally for the Republican contender. His brief message echoed parts of what he has previously stated online, such as his false allegation that Democrats seek to take away people’s ability to vote. (In fact, Republicans have filed lawsuits in some states to reduce the electorate, mostly by rejecting voters who are more likely to vote Democratic.)
“The other side wants to take away your freedom of speech,” Mr. Musk stated during the rally. “They want to take away your rights to bear arms. They essentially want to take away your freedom to vote.
Mr. Musk, a typically reserved public speaker with a net worth of more than $260 billion according to Forbes, increased his intensity level. He frequently reminded those watching to make sure they were registered to vote and pushed them to be “a pest” when it came to reminding others about voting.
Mr. Musk has been heavily involved in that endeavour, having established the America PAC, a super PAC focused on ground game methods to aid the Trump campaign in critical swing states.
While they used to criticise one other, Mr. Musk and Mr. Trump have since formed a strong friendship, with Mr. Musk lending
his star power and his large platform on X to the Trump campaign.
In August, he interviewed the president on a live audio conversation on the platform. That was when Mr. Musk, whose companies have received billions of dollars in federal contracts and subsidies, proposed that he could run a βgovernment efficiency commissionβ in a future Trump administration. The plan to cut federal spending and bureaucracy has become a pillar of Mr. Trumpβs economic plan.
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