Musk Says He's Going to Spend "A Lot Less" on Politics

Elon Musk is in Qatar right now, for some sort of conference hosted by Bloomberg. We cannot discover the subject or the purpose of this conference; it's always a good sign when very rich people are meeting in a faraway country for opaque reasons. Perhaps the subject is "How to Win Friends and Influence People by Giving Them Luxury Jets." We don't know.

In any event, there ARE some reporters there, and they got to ask Musk some questions. And when they asked him about his future political activism, the billionaire said: "In terms of political spending I'm going to do a lot less in the future." He later added "I think I've done enough" and "[I]f I see a reason to do political spending in the future, I will do it, [but] I do not currently see a reason."

It goes without saying that Musk is both mercurial and dishonest. And so, he could be telling a fib, with an eye toward flying much more under the radar. Or, he could be telling the truth, as of the moment, but might well change his mind when the 2026 cycle heats up. On top of that, when you have the kind of coin that Musk has, "I am going to spend less" could still mean "I am going to spend a lot more than anyone other than a couple of hundred people could possibly afford to spend."

With all of that said, it strikes us as very plausible that this is for real. We have no inside information, of course, and Musk did not elaborate beyond the quotes we relay above. However, we did not even break a sweat coming up with 10 reasons he might be ready to move on:

1. Tesla, Possibility 1: It is not a secret that Tesla's brand has taken a big hit since Musk became a political activist, in part because he's behaved in a generally obnoxious fashion, and in part because the politics he's embraced run counter to the politics of much of his customer base. So, he could pull back in hopes of reversing some of the PR damage that's been done.
   
   
2. Tesla, Possibility 2: It is also not a secret that the Tesla Board of Directors is not happy with the damage Musk has done. It's at least possible they gave him an ultimatum: drop the political activism, or get dropped as CEO.
   
   
3. Budget Problems: Did you know that George Washington had to borrow money from friends to get to his inauguration in New York City? The first president was wealthy, yes, but his wealth was tied up almost entirely in not-very-liquid assets, namely land and enslaved people.
   
   Musk has a similar sort of problem. He's wealthy, yes, but it's on paper. What people like him often do—both because selling large blocks of stock tends to create investor unease, and because an alternate arrangement can create a very tax-advantageous situation—is take out loans against their stock holdings. But Musk has already taken out a bunch of loans against his Tesla stock, particularly to finance his purchase of Twitter. And that Tesla stock's price is currently trending downward. The point is, he might be a little cash-strapped these days. Not so much that he can't afford the necessities of life (or the luxuries, for that matter), but maybe enough that an outlay of $200 million or $300 million makes things a little tight.
   
   
4. Shiny Objects, Possibility 1: Musk has a very short attention span, and seems always to be on the lookout for something new and different to do. It was PayPal, then Tesla, then The Boring Company, then SpaceX, then politics. Maybe politics is not new and different anymore, and he's on the lookout for the next toy to play with.
   
   
5. Shiny Objects, Possibility 2: Alternatively, maybe Musk has decided that American politics is not new and different anymore, and that he will be moving on to mucking around in the politics of other nations (see below, for one possible example).
   
   
6. Quitting on Top: (Z) has a portion of a lecture that notes that, at the age of 40, D.W. Griffith made what is probably the most influential movie ever (The Birth of a Nation). The good news there is that, for the rest of your life, you're the person who made this very important movie. The bad news there is that, for the rest of your life, you'll never equal that achievement. Musk and his money may have singlehandedly re-elected Donald Trump. At very least, Musk gave Trump a huge assist. It is improbable that the South African will ever have as favorable a combination of circumstances and candidate than existed in 2024. So, he could be quitting while he's ahead.
   
   
7. Sore Loser: That said, if Musk IS quitting now, it's not entirely while he was ahead. He had the big success in electing Donald Trump, but Musk's last campaign—at least for now—is the train wreck in Wisconsin, where he went all-in, financially and otherwise, in the election for the Supreme Court, and saw his candidate lose by double digits. This might have caused the billionaire to decide to take his ball and go home. Or it could have taught him that money isn't everything in politics, and that past a certain level of spending, each dollar realizes significantly diminishing returns. This experience might even have caused Musk to conclude that his presence does more harm than good, though we kind of doubt it, because he does not seem to have that level of self-awareness.
   
   
8. Too Many Rules: Musk, like Trump, is very impatient and does not like playing by the rules. Musk, unlike Trump, is not president, and puts himself at much greater risk of civil and/or criminal actions if he pushes the boundaries too far. He already did a few things that were right on the border of "legal," like the million-dollar giveaways. If he continues, he might eventually cross the line and get himself in real legal trouble. And since most violations of election law are also state-level crimes, a pardon from Trump would not be helpful.
   
   
9. Pique, Possibility 1: To the extent there was any scuttlebutt yesterday, it's that Musk feels that Republicans have not been sufficiently grateful for his help. We're not sure if this is true or, if so, what exactly that might mean. But it's certainly plausible that his fee-fees are hurt and he's jumping ship as a result.
   
   
10. Pique, Possibility 2: Similarly, Musk might have soured on Donald Trump. Trump, of course, uses people until he has no need for them, at which point they are discarded. In the last month, Musk and DOGE have been increasingly on an island. It could be that he and Trump had words, or merely that Musk feels Trump is not being forceful enough in defending DOGE.

It took us just a few minutes to come up with these possibilities, and there are undoubtedly additional plausible possibilities we did not think of.

The point is that Musk definitely could be serious. If so, that has two obvious implications. The first is that Musk was one of five people—along with Timothy Mellon, Miriam Adelson, Richard Uihlein and Ken Griffin—who gave at least $100 million to Republicans in 2024. The loss of that kind of giving in 2026, when the GOP will likely be facing headwinds, would be a real setback (especially since Adelson tends to sit out midterms).

The second issue is that one of the biggest tools in Donald Trump's vote-whipping toolkit is the threat that Musk will fund a primary challenger to any Republican who fails to vote the party line. If that threat is gone, then it will be more difficult to enforce party discipline, and at the very time that the House is working on a very tricky budget bill. (Z)

Legal News: Supreme Court Rules in A.A.R.P. v. Trump

The name of this case most certainly gives the wrong impression. While the suit does involve an elderly person who may be past their prime, that individual is not on the side of the plaintiffs. This is actually one of the key lawsuits filed in response to Donald Trump's invocation of the Alien Enemies Act (AEA). It was brought by the ACLU on behalf of two people known only by their initials, for their own safety: A.A.R.P. and W.M.M. Due to the possibility of a misunderstanding, perhaps on the part of the respondent, the AARP has asked for the name to be changed to W.M.M. v. Trump. While some outlets have honored the request, it's still officially known as A.A.R.P. v. Trump.

With that out of the way, allow us to remind everyone that the ACLU brought its initial case on behalf of detainees who were being summarily removed and flown to El Salvador in the district court in D.C. in front of Judge James Boasberg. After the government appealed Boasberg's grant of a temporary restraining order (TRO) to the Supreme Court, SCOTUS vacated Boasberg's order and held that the detainees had to bring their cases as individual habeas corpus petitions in the district where those detainees were being held.

This set off a scramble to find the detainees and get them into the various district courts before they were deported. A judge in Southern Texas, namely U.S. District Judge Fernando Rodriguez Jr., has already ruled on the substance of the case there and held that Trump is unlawfully using the Alien Enemies Act. He issued a permanent injunction against any use of that law to remove anyone held in his judicial district.

Meanwhile, in the northern district of Texas, where the Bluebonnet detention facility is located, the ACLU filed cases on behalf of men detained there. This is A.A.R.P. v. Trump. The plaintiffs applied for a TRO while the case was litigated and the district court denied it, holding that there was no imminent threat of immediate removal. At the very same time, the men were being loaded onto buses for their immediate removal. After then applying for an emergency TRO in both the district court and the Fifth Circuit, and getting no answer in either, they applied to the Supreme Court for an emergency stay. On April 19, at around 1 a.m., the Court ordered the government "not to remove any member of the putative class of detainees" to preserve the Court's jurisdiction to consider the application for an emergency stay. What that means is that, at that juncture, they hadn't granted the emergency stay but had granted a sort of pre-stay while they considered the request for an emergency stay. SCOTUS also said that they would hold off ruling on the application until the Fifth Circuit had weighed in. The Fifth Circuit subsequently ruled that it lacked jurisdiction to hear the appeal on the grounds that the district court wasn't given enough time to issue a ruling.

Last Friday, the Supreme Court granted the plaintiff's application for an emergency stay and remanded the case back to the Fifth Circuit to determine the precise process the government must provide to satisfy the detainees' due process rights under the Fifth Amendment. In granting the request for an injunction while the litigation is pending, the order did several significant things.

The first of those is that, in addition to granting the stay, SCOTUS also styled the application as a petition for writ of certiorari, to allow the Fifth Circuit to issue a ruling on some of the substance of the case. SCOTUS said that, at this point, it was not ruling on whether the government can invoke the Alien Enemies Act, only that the Trump administration must afford the detainees some meaningful notice to allow them to sufficiently challenge the use of the AEA, and the minimal notice given here was nowhere near sufficient. It referenced the Abrego Garcia case and the fact that the government maintains that "it is unable to provide for the return of an individual deported in error to a prison in El Salvador, where it is alleged that detainees face indefinite detention." In light of this potential life sentence, even in the case of admitted mistakes by the government, the Supremes noted that it is especially critical that the government provide reasonable notice and sufficient time to seek habeas relief.

Second, it allowed the detainees to proceed as a putative class on the notice rights issue, and held that "the named applicants, along with putative class members, are entitled to constitutionally adequate notice prior to any removal, in order to pursue appropriate relief." So, who is part of the putative class? Every immigration detainee who has been, is being, or will be held in the northern district of Texas and is subject to Trump's proclamation. This makes it rather easier for detainees to mount a defense, since they won't each have to find (and potentially pay for) counsel.

Third, in addition to ordering the Fifth Circuit to address the issue of what notice is due, SCOTUS also ordered them to address "the likelihood of success on the merits, as to the named plaintiffs' underlying habeas claims that the AEA does not authorize their removal pursuant to the president's March 14, 2025 Proclamation." Those are very specific instructions, which direct the judges on the Fifth Circuit to examine the validity of Trump's invocation of the AEA.

If you would like to read more, Steve Vladeck has an excellent summary of the Supreme Court's order here. But the upshot is that things are heating up, quickly. Stay tuned. (L)

Are You Serious?, Part I: Break the Law, Threaten the VP, Get $5 million

The name Ashli Babbitt will presumably ring a bell for readers; she's the woman who participated in the 1/6 Insurrection, and was among the people who breached the Capitol. As she moved forward into the Speaker's Lobby, the Capitol Police perceived her as a threat to then-VP Mike Pence. They told her, several times, to back off. When she chose to keep moving forward instead, they opened fire and killed her. Following a pair of investigations, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Columbia and the Capitol Police cleared the responsible officer of any wrongdoing.

Is there any world in which Babbitt is NOT a criminal, one who paid the ultimate price for her illegal acts (and for ignoring the commands of law enforcement officials who were armed to the teeth)? The answer is: Yes, there is such a world, namely TrumpWorld. Babbitt's family filed a $30 million wrongful death suit against the federal government and the Department of Justice decided to settle for $5 million.

It is inconceivable that settling the suit makes good sense from a defense standpoint. Babbitt's family had zero chance of prevailing, and the cost of defending the lawsuit would have been far less than $5 million. However, it makes excellent sense from a corrupt standpoint. By pardoning the 1/6 insurrectionists, and writing a fat check to the family of the insurrectionist who got killed, Donald Trump sends the message to the violent elements in his base, like Enrique Tarrio and Stewart Rhodes: "I've got your back." That message may not be truthful, mind you—Trump has many times backtracked on commitments of this sort, both political and economic. But as long as the MAGA faithful think they have legal armor, they might well be persuaded to do Trump's illegal and/or violent bidding, should it come to that.

Meanwhile, just yesterday, we suggested that someone should punch J.D. Vance in the face. If threatening Mike Pence's life is worth $5 million, then that's gotta be good for at least $1 million, right? (Z)

Are You Serious?, Part II: DHS Considering Immigration Reality Show

This is yet another news item that, if you tried to make it into an episode of The West Wing, would be rejected as utterly implausible. And yet, here we are.

Rob Worsoff is a producer of schlocky-but-successful reality TV shows, most notably Duck Dynasty and Millionaire Matchmaker. And he has pitched the Trump-led Department of Homeland Security on a new concept: a show in which a dozen or so immigrant contestants would compete in an Amazing Race-style competition, with the prize being U.S. citizenship.

When reporters heard about this, they presumed (hoped?) it was just the throw-it-at-the-wall-and-see-what-sticks brainstorming of a schlocky-but-successful reality TV producer. So, the reporters asked a DHS official if such a program is really being planned. There is only one correct answer to that question, and it is: "No, of course not, we would never consider such a thing." However, the actual answer was that DHS hasn't decided yet, and is in the middle of conducting a "vetting process."

It is absolutely unbelievable that the proposal could even get that far, even under the leadership of a reality-TV president. To start, the optics are just awful. On learning the news, the first thing that approximately 100% of people thought of was the book/movie series The Hunger Games, in which second-class residents of a nation called Panem compete in a competition to the death for the amusement of the fascist government and its wealthy benefactors. Is that really the sort of allegory the Trump administration wants to put out there? Worsoff specifically rejected that notion, and said his proposed show would be a "love letter" to America. He can say whatever he wants; that isn't going to stop people from thinking about The Hunger Games.

A second problem, and one that the administration might actually care about, is that the whole notion runs entirely contrary to Trump's messaging on immigration. Citizenship is ostensibly supposed to be a precious jewel, bestowed only on the worthy, with everyone else to be banished. Giving citizenship away, like it's a lifetime supply of soup, is not only unfair to those who followed the rules and did it the right way, it also cheapens the privilege. Can you imagine what Democrats would say? "It's not enough to be born here, but it IS enough if you win Donald Trump's Amazing Citizenship Race?"

A third problem, and one that the administration undoubtedly does not care one bit about, is that the concept is cruel. We can imagine a documentary series in which the stories of, say, five immigrants from five continents are tracked over the years, letting viewers learn their stories, and humanizing them. However, the moment you have 12 people and one winner, that means you also have eleven losers. What happens to them, after they've been exploited for the entertainment of the masses? Do they get sent back to the country from which they came? Do they get to stay, but spend another 3-4 years dealing with the bureaucracy? This isn't like Wheel of Fortune; there are no consolation prizes to soften the blow of losing.

And a final problem is this: handing out citizenship like this probably isn't legal. It is true that Trump can announce that [WINNER] is a citizen, and then can tell DHS to leave that person alone, but that doesn't mean they are actually citizens.

We think, and we hope, that this show will not come to pass, and that DHS will pull its collective heads out of its collective a**, and tell Worsoff to pound sand. But such is the character of this administration that we just can't be sure. (Z)

Election Results, Domestic: Centrist Wins in Pittsburgh

The yinzers held their mayoral primary yesterday. And inasmuch as the last time Pittsburgh elected a Republican to that office, Herbert Hoover was the president, the Democratic primary was the de facto election. In that primary, incumbent mayor Ed Gainey, who is Black and progressive, was defeated by Allegheny County Controller Corey O'Connor, who is white and moderate, 53% to 47%.

The angle that most national outlets have taken is that this result is "another setback" for progressives. For example, Billy Witz, writing for The New York Times, declared: "Mr. Gainey's defeat is the latest in a string of losses in deep-blue cities, most notably in San Francisco and Oakland, that have raised the volume on questions about progressive officeholders, as their wing of Democratic Party seeks to wrest control from centrist leaders who have struggled to counter President Trump."

Presumably, readers will not be surprised that we are very, very leery of drawing broad, national conclusions from local elections, particularly local election primaries. First, across both the Democratic and Republican primaries in Pittsburgh, about 65,000 people voted. That's a turnout of around 25%, and not likely a representative 25%.

Second, these local elections tend to be shaped by—wait for it—local considerations. We will give you two dynamics, specific to this election, that likely played a role in the outcome. The first of those is that the city budget, like most city budgets these days, is in rough shape. And O'Connor hit Gainey hard on not fixing that, in particular not compelling major nonprofits like UPMC, AHN, Pitt and CMU, who don't pay taxes, to kick some money into the town's coffers. That sounds more like a "throw the bums out" argument to us, not so much a centrist vs. progressive argument. Meanwhile, the second of those local considerations is that O'Connor's father Bob was mayor a bit less than 20 years ago, and died in office from a brain tumor. There were almost certainly some "we like this family" votes, or even some "complete your dad's unfinished work" sympathy votes.

Third, in our experience, when it comes to how blue a city (or state) is, pundits tend to confuse "wide" with "deep." What do we mean by that? Well, we don't know Pittsburgh very well, but we do know San Francisco. And while that city has many, many Democratic voters, they are largely moderate Democratic voters. This is the city that gave us Nancy Pelosi, Dianne Feinstein, Kamala Harris, Gavin Newsom and Xavier Becerra. None of these people is going to be confused with Karl Marx. Or even Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT). The point here is that Pittsburgh probably isn't a flaming lefty city rejecting progressivism, it's probably a flaming center-left city returning to its historical norm.

Anyhow, that's our take. Readers' opinions may vary, of course. (Z)

Election Results, Foreign: Centrist Wins in Romania

For those who are keeping count, there is now another country that, given the choice between a far-right populist who is cozy with Vladimir Putin, and a sane centrist who backs Ukraine, chose the centrist. That country is Romania, the centrist is president-elect Nicușor Dan, and the crazypants populist is George Simion, founder and leader of the Alliance for the Union of Romanians, a far-right party modeled on Germany's AfD.

This election has actually been quite the soap opera. Romania was supposed to elect a new president last year. The first round of voting took place on November 24, and Călin Georgescu, who ran as an independent in a six-way race, claimed a plurality of 22.9%. In second was center-right candidate Elena Lasconi, who took 19.2%, and in third was the sitting president, Marcel Ciolacu, whose Social Democratic Party is center-left, but who is himself somewhat right-wing. Simion finished a pretty distant fourth, with 13.9% of the vote, while Dan was not a candidate.

What should have happened next was a runoff between the top two finishers, to be held on December 4 of last year. However, there was ample evidence of Russian meddling in the election, with the result that the Romanian Constitutional Court annulled the election and ordered a re-run, one in which Georgescu was barred from running. This is because he was charged with numerous crimes, including being a fascist. Maybe the U.S. should look into a law like that.

The re-run of the first round of voting was held on May 4, and resulted in Dan and Simion advancing to the run-off. The second round of voting actually happened this time, and was held on Sunday. When the ballots were counted, Dan won easily, taking 53.6% of the vote to 46.4% for Simion.

Readers may wonder if these foreign elections have any relevance to American politics. Fair enough. Clearly, the basic beats here have some pretty clear parallels in contemporary American politics. But beyond that, there was a pretty strong narrative that Simion was sure to win. This was based primarily on the notion that right-wing candidates took the great majority of the vote in last year's (vacated) election, so of course the right-wing Simion was going to take the great majority of the vote in this one.

This narrative was not, it should be noted, supported by polling. There were 15 head-to-head polls taken before the first round of voting was conducted, and Dan lead Simion in 10 of them. There were 9 head-to-head polls taken after the first round of voting, and Dan led Simion in 5 of them. In fact, one pollster—Noi, Cetățenii—predicted that the final tally would be 55% for Dan, 45% for Simion. They missed by one point, well within the 2.6% margin of error.

Anyhow, Simion is now claiming that his loss was fraudulent, and that Dan won due to interference from France and Moldova. And several prominent members of the Trump administration, most obviously Elon Musk, have jumped in on the side of Simion. They don't have any evidence, mind you, but Musk & Co. would much prefer that countries be run by right-wing anti-Ukraine proto-fascists than by anti-Russia/pro-EU centrists. It's a reminder that Musk and his ilk are just reactionaries who declare whatever they want to be true, and then try to make that stick. It's also a reminder that when it comes to polling, the pollster's model of the electorate is crucial. There was very high turnout on Sunday, and those pollsters who foresaw that got the outcome right. Those who did not, did not.

We don't like to overdo it on the foreign elections, but we'll probably do one, or maybe two, more tomorrow. (Z)

---

If you wish to contact us, please use one of these addresses. For the first two, please include your initials and city.

• questions@electoral-vote.com    For questions about politics, civics, history, etc. to be answered on a Saturday
• comments@electoral-vote.com   For "letters to the editor" for possible publication on a Sunday
• corrections@electoral-vote.com To tell us about typos or factual errors we should fix
• items@electoral-vote.com            For general suggestions, ideas, etc.

To download a poster about the site to hang up, please click here.

---

Email a link to a friend.

---The Votemaster and Zenger