Tipsheet

Elon Musk Weighing in on the CR Has Sent Dems Into a Tizzy

Rebecca Downs
Rebecca Downs  |  December 19, 2024 12:30 PM

The text of the continuing resolution (CR) released on Tuesday night has turned out to be a complete and total failure. Elon Musk, in addition to conservative members of Congress, has been particularly critical. Now, President-elect Donald Trump has also come out against the CR, and Democrats are lashing out, going with a common narrative as they do so. 

Musk and Rep. Maxwell Frost (D-FL) have been going at it over Musk's opposition to the spending bill, with Musk calling out the 40 percent pay increase for members, in particular. 

Frost referred to Musk as a "Co-President" in no less than two posts on Wednesday night. 

In those posts, Musk was expressing his relief that most people lashed out against the spending bill and called for voting out of office members who voted for the CR. That's how our system is supposed to work. Musk has continued to double down on such a view. 

Musk replied to a post from FL Voice News' Eric Daugherty that Frost is "just mad he didn’t get his 40% raise to a quarter million dollars a year," and mocked his idea of "Empathy for working people." 

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Frost also reposted Rep. Mark Pocan (D-WI), who referred to Musk as '"President-Elect'" and mentioned Trump as the former president.

Pocan was mentioned in a post from Axios after he posted an AI-generated image "from the future" of Trump swearing in Musk at the inauguration to take place next month. The far-left congressman issued warnings for Trump in an interview with the outlet. 

"This is going to turn out to be an epic problem at some point for Donald Trump — the two biggest egos on the planet colliding thinking they are in charge," he said. "Donald Trump at some point is not going to accept that. So I'm just going to invest in popcorn for the next year."

Other members named in that piece include Rep. Jim McGovern (D-MA), who claimed that Musk is "president and Trump is now vice president." There's also Rep. Becca Balint (D-VT), who mentioned she would be speaking to those in Vermont who voted for Trump. "I'm going to be talking to my folks back home in Vermont who voted for Trump: You thought you voted for Trump, but in fact, Trump just caved to Musk," she said. "It's terrifying."

She also put out a video over X, ranting that Musk "has no place inserting himself like he’s the president when Congress is trying to get disaster relief to those who need it."

Perhaps the most shocking point comes from Rep. Annie Kuster (D-NH), who decided to focus on Musk's... national origin?

"He's not American. He doesn't know about our democracy. He doesn't know about our processes," Kuster is described as having "fumed." Axios even needed to add their own little fact-check, reminding that "Musk was born in South Africa but became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 2002." Further, we're not even a democracy, but rather a constitutional republic. 

Then there's Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY), and his response on Wednesday to the news that Trump was "totally against" the CR. Goldman claimed that "the Puppet President-Elect weighs in to faithfully execute his benefactor Elon Musk's orders."

He also repeated those same talking points in a hysterical manner over MSNBC on Wednesday night.

Although such a complaint doesn't have to do with the spending bill, there's another particularly noteworthy mention from Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), who just can't help herself when it comes to attacking Musk. Earlier this week, she threw a fit over conflicts of interest she's concerned Musk has, and on Wednesday put out a post about Musk serving as an "unofficial co-president" of Trump, again referencing a letter she sent to Trump on Monday. 

There's so far been over 5,000 replies in less than 24 hours, and plenty of quoted reposts as well, as many remind Warren that there have been concerns about President Joe Biden for some time now. 

The New York Times came out with a report on Tuesday about Biden's declining mental faculties, which was featured in Wednesday morning's edition of POLITICO Playbook, as we covered earlier. On Thursday morning, The Wall Street Journal was out with another piece, "How the White House Functioned With a Diminished Biden in Charge," confirming what we knew all along on how the president is not well.