Musk Mobilizes the Masses
Rob Bluey /
Elon Musk isn’t messing around, and he just got a massive scalp to prove it.
The billionaire owner of X started his day by posting a photo of the 1,500-page spending bill in Congress with this question: “Ever seen a bigger piece of pork?”
Scores of Musk posts and reposts followed Wednesday, sending members of Congress scrambling to quickly declare their opposition as calls and emails began flooding the Capitol.
By the afternoon, President-elect Donald Trump declared his opposition. And within hours, House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., pulled the bill he had unveiled just a day earlier.
“Elon just became the most powerful person in Washington, D.C., today,” social media influencer Wall Street Mav told The Daily Signal. “He proved he can flip enough votes in Congress to halt a spending bill.”
That’s no easy feat given Congress’ annual ritual of busting the budget.
Congressional leaders, who were hoping to pass the so-called continuing resolution by Friday, turned out to be no match for Musk and the legion of other popular X accounts who railed against pork-barrel spending.
Musk’s relentless focus on the bill Wednesday was particularly salient given his role with Vivek Ramaswamy to lead the Department of Government Efficiency, whose mission is to reduce waste and cut $2 trillion in spending.
Those goals would be harder to accomplish with a bloated spending bill that adds billions in new spending.
>>> What’s Hidden in Spending Bill Congress Must Pass to Keep the Government Open?
The continuing resolution, which would fund the government until March, was supposed to be lawmakers’ final vote before heading home for Christmas. Instead of a “clean” bill, however, Democrat and Republican negotiators loaded it with a hodge-podge of unrelated policy and additional spending, including a pay raise for members of Congress.
That caught the attention of Ramaswamy, whose video Musk shared with his followers.
“Congress is about to pass a bill that blows away your taxpayer money, but they made it over 1,500 pages long so you wouldn’t read it,” Ramaswamy said. “And the worst part is, they didn’t want you to know about any of it. That’s why they made this a last-minute jam job.”
Ramaswamy asked his social media followers to contact Congress. Musk made the same plea.
The result?
Rep. Andy Barr, R-Ky., told Fox News’ Chad Pergram that lawmakers got the message.
“The phone was ringing off the hook today. And you know why? Because they were reading the tweets, the X from Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, and they were telling me that they were, that they were listening to them. This shows the influence that President Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and Vivek Ramaswamy have in this process before they’re even in office.”
>>> Trump, Vance Throw Curveball Into Spending Fight as Hill Scrambles to Fund Government
Rep. Andy Harris, R-Md., chairman of the House Freedom Caucus, pointed to Musk’s work on DOGE as a reason for opposing the bill.
“Vivek Ramaswamy and Elon Musk recognize that if they are empowered to somehow reduce government spending and reduce our deficit because, as Elon Musk says, deficit equals inflation, that’s the bottom line,” Harris said. “When we do deficit spending, we are printing money. We are causing inflation.”
Republicans who were quick to embrace DOGE’s mission last month didn’t have a choice. Musk made sure they knew the consequences.
“Unless @DOGE ends the careers of deceitful, pork-barrel politicians, the waste and corruption will never stop,” Musk wrote.
After spending $277 million of his own fortune to aid Trump this year, Musk has threatened to use his war chest against weak-kneed Republicans who have questioned the president-elect’s nominees and his America First agenda.
Musk put it bluntly Wednesday afternoon: “Any member of the House or Senate who votes for this outrageous spending bill deserves to be voted out in 2 years!”
Conversely, Musk rewarded the bill’s critics by sharing their posts with his 207 million followers—helping to fuel outrage against the bill.
“If not for X, Congress would have gotten away with this ridiculous spending bill,” the account End Wokeness posted. “Business as usual is OVER.”
Musk, who was ridiculed by legacy media journalists for purchasing Twitter for $44 billion in 2022, might just have the last laugh.
“I don’t think it’s really sunk in yet just how powerful X is now. We’re in the middle of an organic cultural and political revolution to give power back to the people,” activist Robby Starbuck wrote. “History will smile on us for what we’ve done here, especially [Elon Musk] for buying it.”