Trump conducts the weirdest exit interview in history as Musk departs the White House — for now
ANALYSIS: The most destructive professional partnership since Emperor Palpatine and Darth Vader shacked up in the Death Star has finally come to an end, at least in an official government employee capacity, writes Richard Hall
Elon Musk’s exit interview began like any other.
The boss heaped praise on the departing employee while demonstrating a tenuous grasp of exactly what it is he did. The employee vastly inflated his achievements, and the pair made vague promises to stay in touch.
From there, it veered into a freewheeling discussion about transgender mice, Musk’s alleged prolific use of horse tranquilizer, nuclear war between India and Pakistan, and a potential pardon for Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs, should he be convicted.
Now that Musk’s legally limited 130-day term as a “special government employee” is over, the most destructive professional partnership since Emperor Palpatine and Darth Vader shacked up in the Death Star has finally come to an end.
Trump and Musk, the powerful bromance that shook the world, are taking a break — for now at least.
The hour-long farewell, in front of the world’s press, came just hours after a New York Times exposé alleged the world’s richest man had taken so much Ketamine during the 2024 presidential campaign that it affected his bladder.
Musk did little to calm those rumors as he turned up sporting a black eye (the result of mutual combat with his five-year-old son, he says), wearing a cap, a “Dogefather” t-shirt, and at one point rolling his head around to stare at the ceiling as the president spoke.
Sitting at the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office, Trump lauded his friend standing beside him for the savings he claimed to have made, which are almost certainly exaggerated.
“You know the kinds of things that he's found, and his people have found… They found things that are pretty unbelievable. I have to say that the numbers that we're talking about are substantial, but they're going to be very much more substantial with time,” Trump said.
He praised the Tesla founder and CEO for delivering a “colossal change in the old ways of doing business in Washington.”
Musk indeed shattered norms by ignoring outdated hiring practices that prize experience and expertise and instead placing 19-year-old hackers with nicknames like “Big Balls” in charge of government departments.
Or as President Trump put it: “DOGE has installed geniuses with an engineering mindset and unbelievably talented people in computers.”
The world’s richest person also broke new ground by becoming one of the most deadly bureaucrats in the history of the U.S. government, killing an estimated 15,000 people with his deep cuts to the U.S. Agency for International Development.
Trump could not have been more effusive in his praise, placing Musk’s four-month stint as a cost-cutting consultant in the ranks of America’s great heroes, somewhere between Miracle on the Hudson's Sully Sullenberger and Captain America.
“Elon’s service to America has been without comparison in modern history," Trump said, noting the huge sacrifice Musk had made by having to endure people being mean to him online.
“He willingly accepted the outrageous abuse and slander and lies and attacks, because he does love our country,” Trump went on.
Anyone hoping for an end to the friendship that ended thousands of government careers would be sorely disappointed.
“Elon is really not leaving,” Trump said. “He's going to be back and forth, I have a feeling. It's his baby, and I think he's going to be doing a lot of things.”
Musk agreed.
"I expect to continue to provide advice, whatever the President would like advice... I expect to remain a friend and an advisor, and certainly, if there's anything the President wants me to do, I'm at the President's service," he said.
But for now, Musk is returning to his many businesses, which are all simultaneously suffering from significant brand damage due to their association with him.
In one particularly awkward moment, Musk batted away a question from a journalist concerning Friday’s published allegations about his drug use, which reportedly included Ecstasy, psychedelic mushrooms and Adderall, in addition to ketamine.
“Is the New York Times — is that the same publication that got a Pulitzer Prize for false reporting on the Russiagate? Is that the same organization? I think it is,” he said, theatrically turning to Trump. “I think it is.”
But Musk couldn’t leave without first reeling off a list of excuses for why he didn’t achieve what he set out to do. He claimed he could cut $1 trillion from the federal budget before September 30 by ending "waste, fraud, and abuse," but now even his own likely cooked numbers have failed to meet that target.
“Obviously, at times, when you cut expenses, those who are receiving the money, whether they receive whether they're receiving that money legitimately or not, they do complain, and you're not going to hear someone confessing that they receive money inappropriately. Never,” he said.
He even saw fit to appropriate Hannah Arendt’s famous "banality of evil" quote to draw a bizarre comparison with government spending and Nazi Germany.
“It's the banal evil of bureaucracy. It's sort of the frankly, largely uncaring nature of bureaucracy,” he went on.
And perhaps more ominously for anyone who relies on USAID for their lifesaving HIV medication, or anyone with a job in the U.S. government, or anyone who needs government healthcare to survive, Musk promised that his mission would continue.
“The DOGE team will only grow stronger over time, the DOGE influence will only grow stronger. I liken it to a sort of Buddhism, it's like a way of life,” he said, demonstrating a clear lack of understanding about Buddhism and life.
In other words, this Rasputin for the McKinsey age is not going anywhere.
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