Elon Musk claims he's leaving politics — no one should believe him
With great excitement this week, the story tore through the press: Billionaire Elon Musk is leaving the government! May 28 and 29, the headlines were dominated by reports that the chainsaw-wielding head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) was resigning from his position in government. Musk himself hustled to sell the story by giving shame-faced interviews, seeding the notion that he and Donald Trump had a contentious break-up, claiming he's "disappointed" by Trump and complaining about being the administration's "whipping boy."
If it all seems familiar, that's because we've been through this cycle before. In late March and early April, we were treated to a round of "Musk is leaving" headlines, which helped temporarily boost the sinking stock price of his car company, Tesla. His exit didn't take. In late April, Musk again dramatically announced his departure, promising Tesla shareholders that "my time allocation to DOGE will drop significantly." We were treated to another round of "Musk is leaving, we swear" stories in early May, complete with colorful details of the billionaire saying he'll miss sleeping over at the White House and eating ice cream with Trump. But somehow, he kept not going away. Musk was on camera in the Oval Office during Trump's racist ambush of South African President Cyril Ramaphosa last week.
Earlier this week, Tesla faced another bleak financial report. European sales fell by half in the past year, even as other electric car companies saw robust growth. Investors got antsy again, and the growing pressure led a group of pension fund leaders to write to the Tesla board, demanding that they force Musk to return to work. Like clockwork, Musk once again announced his departure from DOGE to return to Tesla, going on CBS with an "Occupy Mars" T-shirt and telling the Washington Post he's refocusing his efforts on his alleged mission to send human beings to Mars.
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Credulously repeating Musk's claims that he's leaving the government, as far too many media outlets have done, helps Musk soothe the frayed nerves of his investors. However, it is not good journalism, and not just because the past few months have shown that Musk's farewells mean nothing. Musk's entire history shows that the man's word is worth less than nothing. Musk built his tremendous wealth not through innovation, tech genius, or business acumen, but on his skill at blowing smoke.
Musk's entire history shows that the man's word is worth less than nothing. Musk built his tremendous wealth not through innovation, tech genius, or business acumen, but on his skill at blowing smoke.
Wired, which has been one of the few outfits reliably reporting on Musk with the proper levels of skepticism, published a critical article Tuesday laying out how Musk has more in common with PT Barnum than Thomas Edison. As Carlton Reid demonstrates, for a shocking 19 years, Musk has kept investor cash flowing by making bold predictions of dazzling products on the horizon in the next year or two. Musk promised self-driving cars, fast travel that could get you from Boston to New York City "in less than half an hour," an army of intelligent robot servants, self-charging cars, brain chips for intelligence enhancement, and affordable family cars. None of it happened, but Musk keeps pitching new ideas and making false promises so fast that investors forget how he failed to deliver on all these exciting past promises.
Musk understands that people will buy anything if they want to believe your nonsense badly enough. Tesla investors are especially vulnerable to false reassurances. The truth is too hard to accept: they bet a fortune on a bad horse. Tesla's sales aren't going down because Musk isn't spending enough time at work. It's because his hard turn to the right — including his infamous quacks-like-a-Nazi salute at a Trump rally — poisoned his brand with the left-leaning customer base of Tesla.
The protest movement against him, called "Tesla takedown," has also been successful at generating viral stories that make it seem embarrassing to own a Tesla. Just this week, for instance, pundit Chris Cillizza displayed the lack of self-awareness he's known for with a bratty article at the Daily Beast, complaining about "vandalism" inflicted on his Tesla. A photo of the alleged "vandalism" was helpfully shared in the article:
Also: for the record, the image below is the note taped to Chris’ car that he describes as “defacing” and “vandalism” I like the Beast so I choose to believe they let him write this to humiliate himself.
— TACOHat (@kenwhite.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 7:20 PM
Cillizza whines, "Not everything has to be political." But now there's a reason to shun the Tesla beyond just opposition to fascism, or the fact that they're ugly and hard to fix. It's also because it's the car of crybabies. Musk himself is the biggest crybaby of all, telling the Washington Post, "People were burning Teslas. Why would you do that? That’s really uncool." This is the same Musk who spent months gloating about how he's ruining the lives of thousands of people with his reckless attacks on federal employees. This is the same Musk who shrugged off reports that his cuts are killing people. There is little doubt he feels the suffering of a vandalized Tesla far more than a child who is starving to death because he destroyed USAID.
It's this ego that allows us to predict with confidence that Musk's departure is fake and, as he has done in previous iterations of this story, he will sneak his way back into the White House. He's too addicted to the power and attention he gets from politics to live the boring life of a respectable businessman focused on responsible management. Even before DOGE, Musk had a frightful habit of posting online, often tweeting 100 times a day. I can't manage that even on weekend days when I'm bored on my couch. There's no way he was working at his official jobs full-time, as there's a very public record showing he spent most of his days online engaging with far-right content. While he's trying to perform discipline now, mostly tweeting about his businesses, it's unlikely he'll be able to keep up the ruse for too long. Musk, like Trump, is too narcissistic. Like Trump, he won't be able to stay away from the firehose of ego gratification provided by being a leader in the MAGA cult.
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