Elon Musk’s bromance with President Donald Trump appears to be souring. And honestly, it’s about time.
The relationship that’s defined much of the second Trump administration is breaking down, according to those close to the president and everyone else who’s been paying attention. Since taking office in January, the Musk–Trump partnership has been central to White House operations. But with Musk stepping away from the limelight, there are signs that the personal bond between the two has frayed.
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Musk has been clashing with major players in the administration. He went head-to-head with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent over the IRS, bumped heads with Secretary of State Marco Rubio over the decision to kill USAID, and made headlines of his own by pouring millions into Wisconsin’s Supreme Court race, only to see his preferred candidate lose in a landslide.
Now he’s backing off and turning critical. On Tuesday, Musk said he was disappointed by Trump’s “big, beautiful bill.”
Plenty of people saw this coming. It doesn’t exactly take a wild imagination to predict that two billionaire egomaniacs who have never experienced real accountability wouldn’t last long working side by side. These are guys who are clearly surrounded by sycophants and allergic to criticism. Of course they were going to turn on each other the second things got tense.
When asked if he’d keep spending money on politics, Musk said, “I think I’ve done enough.” And that’s that.
You don’t have to be clairvoyant to know what happens when unstable public figures are locked in a room together. It always blows up. And in a media environment where disinformation, misdirection, and propaganda are bouncing off every wall, it’s a little validating to know that what you’re seeing in real time is actually happening. This craziness has roots in reality. We’re not imagining things. This is the show.
And Musk isn’t the only one Trump is falling out with. Just this week, Trump turned on Russian President Vladimir Putin for the first time in his life.
“I’m not happy with what Putin is doing. He’s killing a lot of people, and I don’t like it at all,” Trump said.
That’s a shift.
His relationship with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also looks rocky. Trump is playing footsie with the Saudi crown prince while supposedly trying to avoid a war with Iran. Meanwhile, Israel is pushing back on a New York Times report that Netanyahu threatened to blow up Iran’s nuclear facilities to derail U.S. talks. They’re calling it fake news.
Let’s not forget that Netanyahu had the nerve to publicly congratulate Joe Biden in 2020. That went over great.
So in just the last few months, Trump has had fallings-out with Musk, Putin, Netanyahu, Chinese President Xi Jinping, and even parts of his own base. The Iran deal chatter has people muttering that it sounds a lot like former President Barack Obama’s. That’s not sitting well with hardline conservatives, to say the least.
Are we seeing a pattern here? Trump seems to be at odds with pretty much everyone. It’s his way or nothing. If he doesn’t get exactly what he wants, he flips the table and storms out.
But what else would you expect from someone who’s never really been told no? People have tried, but no one’s ever really stopped him. He gets what he wants, when he wants it, no matter what. And even if he dropped dead tomorrow, in some twisted sense, he still wins. Because he’s always been unstoppable.
And that’s the tragedy. Trump could have been a great president. He had the talent, the presence, the raw instincts. But he never had the humility. And even his base would have a hard time arguing that he does.
What we’re seeing now feels like his final act. The last defiant push before he fades into the twilight. He’ll only make deals he wrote himself. And it makes sense. He has nothing left to lose, because there’s nothing left to gain. Except maybe Canada. Or Greenland.
We might have officially hit peak Trump. That’s both a good and bad thing.
Good because it means the Trump era is finally starting to wind down—the chaos, the narcissism, the endless culture war loop. It’s starting to burn itself out.
Bad because we’re still in it. What we’re living through right now is a chaotic, directionless mess of an administration. Loyalty matters more than leadership. Dysfunction isn’t just a side effect. It’s the strategy.
There’s no real plan. It’s just vibes, vengeance, and very little vision.
Jesse Edwards is director of Newsweek Radio & Podcasting, and the host of Newsweek Radio.
The views expressed in this article are the writer’s own.
