By Jack Phillips
Contributing Writer
House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., on Sunday downplayed tech billionaire Elon Musk’s critical comments and said that House Republicans will pass the One Big Beautiful Bill Act backed by President Donald Trump.
Last week, Musk and Trump got into a heated back and forth after the Tesla CEO repeatedly bashed the spending bill on social media. Trump suggested that it was because of its cuts to electric vehicle mandates, and at one point floated cutting federal money to Musk’s companies. Meanwhile, Musk took credit for Trump and the GOP winning the 2024 election and threatened to decommission SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft.
“I didn’t go out to craft a piece of legislation to please the richest man in the world,” Johnson told ABC’s “This Week” on Sunday. “What we’re trying to do is help hard-working Americans who are trying to provide for their families and make ends meet.”
During the interview, Johnson said he texted with Musk in recent days amid the escalating public feud with Trump.
Musk, he said, still believes that Republicans’ “policies are better for human flourishing. They’re better for the U.S. economy. They’re better for everything that he’s involved in with his innovation and job creation and entrepreneurship.”
However, he added, “Elon’s number one responsibility is to save his company. The president and I have the responsibility of saving the country.”
Earlier in the week, Musk called the bill a “disgusting abomination” that would add to the U.S. debt and threaten economic stability. The flurry of social media posts that followed included urging voters to flood Capitol Hill with calls to vote against the measure, which is pending in the Senate after clearing the House. It also included promoting controversial comments about impeaching and replacing the president with Vice President JD Vance.
After Musk appeared to show interest in making amends, Trump told reporters over the weekend that he has no desire to repair his relationship with Musk.
Johnson said that claims that people have called members of Congress to “kill the bill” are inaccurate. “It’s not happening, and we checked with colleagues,” the speaker said.
“We’ve got almost no calls to the offices, any Republican member of Congress,” the House speaker added. “And I think that indicates that people are taking a wait-and-see attitude. Some … may be convinced by some of his arguments, but the rest understand: This is a very exciting piece of legislation.”
Over the weekend, Trump warned Musk that he would face “very serious consequences” if the Tesla CEO backed Democratic politicians against Republicans in elections. Musk has not made any indications he would do so but has floated the creation of an alternative political party to Republicans and Democrats.
Trump told NBC News Saturday that Musk will “have to pay very serious consequences if he does that,” although he did not go into specifics.
He also said that he has no plans to speak with Musk and assumed that their relationship is over.
Meanwhile, Russell Vought, who heads the White House Office of Budget and Management, said in an interview with Fox News on Sunday that Congressional Budget Office analysts base their models on “artificial baselines.” Because the 2017 tax law set the lower rates to expire, CBO’s cost estimates presume a return to the higher rates that were in place before that law went into effect, he said.
Musk appeared to have used estimates from the CBO to make his “abomination” post criticizing the budget bill that it would increase the U.S. deficit by $2.5 trillion over the next decade.
Vought acknowledged CBO’s charge from Congress is to analyze legislation and current law as it is written. But he said the office could issue additional analyses, implying it could be friendlier to GOP goals.
When asked whether the White House would ask for alternative estimates, Vought again put the burden on the CBO, repeating that congressional rules allow the office to publish more analysis.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
