Musk, a fierce Trump ally, appeared to break from the president less than two days after Trump was sworn back into office when the SpaceX CEO poured cold water over the new Stargate venture.
Stargate, which Trump announced on Tuesday, involves Sam Altman, Musk's former business partner-turned rival who is the co-founder and CEO of OpenAI. Musk has lobbed barbs at Altman on X for days.
“He is letting this issue [with OpenAI] get in the way of his relationship with Trump," said Darrell West, a senior fellow at the Center for Technology Innovation at the Brookings Institution.
The president said Thursday he’s unbothered by Musk’s public criticism of the artificial intelligence (AI) project, and alluded to the years of tensions between his close adviser and Altman.
“No, it doesn’t. He hates one of the people in the deal,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office when asked if Musk’s criticism bothered him.
“I’ve spoken to Elon. I’ve spoken to all of them, actually. The people in the deal are very, very smart people,” Trump continued. “But Elon, one of the people in the deal he happens to hate, but I have certain hatreds of people too.”
While Trump shrugged off the defection Thursday, some observers said Musk continuing to publicly disagree may not bode well for him, given the president’s history with those who disagree with his policies.
“One thing that we do know is that Trump does not like to be undermined or overshadowed by anybody around him. So, my sense is that that may work for Musk in the short term, but not in the long term,” Democratic strategist Basil Smikle told The Hill.
The Stargate project was announced by Trump alongside Altman, Oracle founder Larry Ellison and SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son this week.
It pledges to invest up to $500 billion in building the infrastructure for AI development and maintenance over the next four years.
Musk claimed the initial investors — OpenAI, SoftBank and Oracle — do not have the money to come up with the project, sparking an online back-and-forth over the promises lauded by Trump.
Read more in a full report at TheHill.com.
