Hi everyone, and welcome back to the Elon Musk Podcast.
I'm your host, Will Walden, and if you're new here, this is a
show all about Elon Musk and his groundbreaking work that he's
doing with his various companies, including Tesla,
SpaceX, The Boring Company, Neurolink, and of course, X.
And before we dive into today's episode, I wanted to share a
quick insight from our shows analytics.
It turns out the 45% of you listening right now are
subscribed to the show and thank you for that.
But that means that 55% of you are not.
So I'm offering you a deal. I promise to do everything in my
power to keep bringing you the latest and most interesting news
about Elon Musk every single day and about his companies.
If you'll do me one favor and hit the subscribe or follow
button on your podcast platform right now, that's it.
Pretty simple and straightforward.
It takes just a second for you, but it makes a huge difference
for the show. Mr. President, I'm a big Boston
Red Sox fan, and one of the most famous players in Red Sox recent
history is Manny Ramirez. Manny Ramirez was a good
baseball player, but he had a habit of doing some pretty
ridiculous things on the field and off the field that were
really detrimental to the team. Some really bizarre on field
behaviour, cutting off throws from other outfielders before
they got to the infield. Bizarre off the field behaviour
that disrupted the team. It became so regular that a
phrase was adopted amongst the Red Sox fans.
That's just Manny being Manny. And over the years it just was
accepted that every year Manny Ramirez is going to do a whole
bunch of stuff that was really detrimental to the team.
And over time, it just kind of became accepted that that was a
fact of life, a way of life with Manny Ramirez.
And as time went on, people reacted less hostilely.
It barely got noticed in some cases when he was engaged in
these detrimental forms of conduct.
And I tell that story because it stands for, you know, a kind of
universal concept. When bad behavior gets
normalized, it no longer feels like bad behavior, even if that
behavior is hurting people. Today, the world is littered
with corrupt governments. Governments where the leaders
and the really rich men who surround the leaders, the
oligarchs, they steal from people.
That's what they do. The leaders and the leaders,
friends just keep a hand constantly in the government
treasury and they steal taxpayer dollars.
They rig the rules of the economy in order to make
themselves fabulously rich. They hurt the citizens of those
countries. Vladimir Putin, for instance,
has never had a job outside of government, but he's reportedly
worth $200 billion. One of his many houses cost $1.4
billion to build. Supposedly, the landscaping
costs on an annual basis for that house are $2,000,000 alone.
That $1.4 billion house was paid for by money he stole from the
Russian treasury. In other words, he stole it from
the Russian people. Putin and his friends have been
doing it for so long, and doing it so openly and brazenly.
Putin, for instance, wears a watch that retails for a half,
$1,000,000. Excuse me, for half, $1,000,000,
even though his official salary is only $140,000.
They've been doing this so openly and brazenly.
They're so public in their corruption in Russia that it's
just accepted. It's just mainstream.
The fact that Putin and his cronies steal from the Russian
people. That's what's happening in
America today. And it's heartbreaking for me to
say this, but in the first six months of the Trump presidency,
Trump and Elon Musk and their billionaire friends have engaged
in a stunning rampage of open public corruption.
It's not fundamentally different than what happened in Russia.
These are efforts to steal from the American people, to enrich
themselves. And their strategy is to do it
all out in the open, to do it at such a dizzying pace that the
country just gets overwhelmed or anesthetized or dulled into a
sense that we just all have to accept the corruption.
Or maybe more charitably, that this is just how government
works, That government is just corrupt.
And so the fact that it's happening out in the open
instead of happening secretly, well, it's really nothing new.
But this is not how government works.
The things that have happened over the last six weeks are
unprecedented. The president and his
billionaire friends are not supposed to steal from us.
They are not supposed to use their power and their access to
power, their access to government levers to rig the
rules to enrich themselves. That has always been wrong.
It is still wrong, and we do not have to accept this.
And so in the next few minutes, I want to try out an exercise.
I want to try to lay out for you as quickly as I can, just some
of the most significant instances of blatantly corrupt
activity that's happened in just the first six weeks of Trump's
presidency. When you see it all together,
there is no way to avoid a simple conclusion.
This White House is on its way to being the most corrupt in the
history of the country, and just because they are doing it out in
the open for everybody to see doesn't mean that it's not
corrupt. And my hope is that if you see
it all in one place, the gravity of this moment may hit you.
My hope is that my colleagues in the public choose not to
normalize a president or his advisors using the Oval Office
as a blunt mechanism to make themselves even wealthier.
It is our decision, our decision to have 0 tolerance for
corruption. It's also our decision to just
decide to become a place like Russia where our leaders are
allowed to routinely steal from us.
So this is a heartbreakingly long list.
This is just 20 or so examples of corrupt behavior in the 1st
six weeks of the Trump presidency.
So here it goes. We're going to start on January
17th. On January 17th, Trump launches
the meme coin. This is maybe the most corrupt
of all the acts, because what is the meme coin?
The meme coin is essentially a mechanism by which Russian
oligarchs or corporate CE OS can literally send money privately
directly to Donald Trump. Nobody knows who buys the meme
coin, but Trump makes money when people buy it, and so it is just
an open sewer valve that allows for anybody who is trying to
influence the Trump administration to be able to
secretly funnel money to Donald Trump.
He reserves 80% of the coin. He waits to release that coin
until the price jumps back up again, which essentially means
he's waiting for people who want favors from him to buy a bunch
of the coin to inflate the value so that he that he releases more
and makes more money. It's it's a disgusting kind of
corruption because this is essentially Trump just posting
his Venmo for anybody secretly to wire him as much money as
they want. We've never seen something like
this before where anybody who has anything to gain from the
Trump administration through a manipulation of the value of
Trump's meme coin can funnel money directly to the president.
Whisper in his ear, That was me. That was me that purchased all
that coin that jumped up the value that allowed you to
release new coin. Hey, take care of me on the back
end. On January 20th, when he sworn
in, he institutes his new energy agenda.
Now open reporting suggested that during the campaign he met
with the oil and gas industry and they cut a deal in which the
oil and gas industry would give him a billion dollars of
campaign contributions in order to receive favorable treatment
when Trump was sworn in. And guess what happens?
On January 20th, Trump unveils his energy strategy and what
does it do? It preferences oil and gas, and
it punishes oil and gases competitors.
It, for instance, freezes all permits on wind projects, both
for the land and the sea. It undercuts permitting
processes not for oil and gas, but for oil and gases
competitors. Oil and gas got exactly what
they asked for. They gave a campaign
contribution, and they got the favorable treatment.
Five days later, Trump fires 17 inspectors general.
What do inspectors general do? They look for corruption inside
of these agencies. What do you do if you are trying
to engage in corruption? If you are trying to steal from
the American people, you fire the inspectors general.
Two days later, on January 27th, Trump fires Quinn Wilcox from
the NLRB. This is the National Labour
Relations Board. When she's fired, the National
Labour Relations Board cannot function any longer.
Why does this matter? Because the person that has been
put in charge of reviewing the hirings and firings of these
agencies is Elon Musk, who by the way has lots of cases before
the NLRB. So do the people that are
standing behind Trump during the inauguration.
Almost all of them have active cases before the NLRB.
The billionaire supporting Donald Trump now don't have to
worry about the NLRB. Because on January 27th, the
NLRB is rendered powerlessness. 3 days later, on January 30th,
Trump awards more than $800,000 worth of stock to several of the
board members of the Trump Media and Technology Group.
This is the publicly traded company behind his social media
platforms. So now his cabinet members,
people like Cash Patel and Linda McMahon, are owning equity in
Trump's media platform, equity that can be cashed out, sold to
people who want to buy them out of their interests at any time.
Those people who might want to buy them out, Cabinet members
could be individuals with issues before the Department of
Education, before the FBI. Yet another Ave. in which people
who have influence, who want to gain influence inside the Trump
administration have a conduit to be able to move cash from their
pocketbooks, from their treasury, from their bank
accounts into the bank accounts of Trump cabinet members.
Shortly thereafter, we start to see the weaponization of the
DOJ. On February 23rd, a civil
complaint from DOJ that had been pending against SpaceX, Elon
Musk's signature company, is dropped.
Eight days later, the DOJ drops a case against a Republican
congressman on February 19th. Two or three weeks later, the
DOJ opens up something called Operation Whirlwind, which seeks
to target anyone who dares try to obstruct or criticize the
work of Elon Musk and Doge. Over the course of the first few
weeks, the DOJ is turned into an entity that drops cases against
those who are loyal to Donald Trump and pursues aggressively
investigations against those who are trying to criticize Donald
Trump. On February 1st, Trump fires the
director of the CFPB and announces plans to shut down to
shutter the Consumer Financial Protection Board.
Again, very much like the NLRB, this is an agency that was at
the moment that it was rendered powerless investigating Elon
Musk and many of the biggest financial backers of Donald
Trump. So once again, those that have
access to Donald Trump, the billionaires that are close to
him now don't have to worry about labour violations being
investigated by the NLRB. Now they don't have to worry
about consumer protection actions being taken against them
by the CFPB. On February 4th, there is the
first of two extraordinary meetings in the White House in
which Donald Trump convenes his business partners, his business
partners, the Saudi Golf League and the PGA, to try to negotiate
a solution to the dispute between those 2G leagues.
Why? Because Trump has a business
interest in that dispute being resolved.
The Saudi Golf League plays tournaments at Trump's course
courses in the United States, and so if the White House, using
its official power, can try to negotiate a settlement between
those two groups, Trump stands to make money.
On February 6th, something absolutely stunning happens.
Pam Bondi, the AG, issues a memorandum in which she proposes
to dull the criminal enforcement of the Foreign Agents
Registration Act. If you are representing a
foreign government before the United States, you have to
register so that we know if you are acting on behalf of American
interests or you are acting on behalf of foreign interests.
In the prior Trump administration, Trump officials
got in big trouble for secretly working for and getting paid by
foreign governments without registering.
Well, what does Trump announce? That they are going to limit the
applicability of the enforcement of that statue, making it much
easier for Trump's friends from for his Mogga crowd, for the
people who show up tomorrow, Lago to get paid quietly by
foreign governments in order to influence Donald Trump on
February 10th. Maybe aside from the meme coin,
the most stunning act of corruption, the Eric Adams quid
pro quo, in which Eric Adams indicted for corruption, is let
off the hook. His charges are dismissed in
exchange for the mayor's pledge of political loyalty to Donald
Trump. They literally went on TV and
announced the deal that we're getting rid of the charges
against Eric Adams as long as the mayor pledges political
loyalty to the president. That was so corrupt that six or
seven DOJ officials resigned because they refused to withdraw
those charges. But the deal went through
because the 7th or the 8th or the 9th official finally filed
the withdrawal. And now in America, it is 100%
clear that if you want to get away with corruption, if you
want to steal from your constituents and you're an
elected official in this country, all you have to do is
just sign up for political loyalty with Donald Trump, and
he will instruct the Department of Justice to let you get away
with it. On February 10th, Donald Trump
directs the DOJ to pause enforcement of US laws that
prohibit companies from paying bribes overseas.
Come on, like, come on. He instructs the DOJ to pause
enforcement of US laws that prohibit companies to pay bribes
overseas. Here's an example.
Goldman Sachs was engaged in outright bribery.
They were paying bribes to Malaysian officials so that they
could get a contract to manage the resources of the Malaysian
sovereign wealth fund. American companies should not be
overseas bribing foreign governments.
That compromises America's reputation and America's
national security. But now we are going to pause
enforcement of the laws that stop American companies from
bribing foreign governments because corruption is now being
normalized. This is what you do if you want
to normalize corruption, is that you make it legal for American
companies to engage in corruption overseas.
That makes it easier for Trump to get away with corruption
here. Two days later, on February
12th, the announcement comes out that the State Department is
going to buy $400 million of armored Teslas.
OK, so now it's getting even more blatant.
It's getting even more brazen. The State Department is just
going to buy a whole bunch of product from Elon Musk, product
that they were not previously scheduled to buy.
It is true that the Biden administration had a blueprint
that was going to buy some electric vehicles, but it was
around $483,000 worth of vehicles.
Trump revises that blueprint of spending so that now the federal
government is going to spend $400 million on on armored
Tesla's from Elon Musk. Let's see, that's February 12th.
That same day, Elon Musk's people infiltrate the Department
of Labor, and reporting suggests that during that infiltration,
Elon Musk's personal representatives get access to
enforcement information at OSHA, not only against Elon Musk's
companies. And by the way, SpaceX has an
employee injury rate that is 9 times higher than the industry
average, but also workplace safety violations against Elon
Musk's competitors. Here's the message.
If you are close to Donald Trump personally, if you support him
politically, you can get secret access to enforcement data
against your country, against your company's and your
company's competitors. That's what happens on February
12th. 3 days later, there's some suspicious firings at the FDA
again related to Elon Musk's personal financial interests.
Elon Musk's owns a medical device company called Neuralink.
It is currently being reviewed by the FDA.
And guess what? On February 15th and 16th, all
over a weekend, there are 20 people fired from the FD as
Office of Neurological and Physical Medicine devices fired
by DOGE, run by Elon Musk. Clear message, you're going to
get fired if you aren't on the right side of Elon Musk's
application. Now, whether that was explicit
or not, if the guy who is firing you has a pending application
before your department, aren't you going to think twice?
Aren't you going to think twice about ruling against his
interests? This is why this is all
unprecedented. It gives us feels normal because
it's been happening every day, but never before in American
history have we allowed someone who has a pending application
for approval of a medicine or a medical device to be able to
personally decide who gets hired and who gets fired at the
Regulatory agency making the decision over that medical
device. But now this stuff is happening
every day because on February 15th as well, that same weekend,
there's an announcement that the FDA cuts are going to be even
deeper, perhaps as big as 50%. That means that hundreds of
drugs and devices won't get approved at the FDA.
And you know who benefits from that?
The folks that are selling the snake oil products.
And guess who's selling the skate?
The snake oil products? The people who work for Donald
Trump selling Vita gummy scams. The director of the FBI is
selling vaccine reversal pills. When the FDA gets gutted, it's
the people who sell those unregulated products who stand
to gain. On February 19th, 4 days later,
we find out that the IRS is going to be cut by 7000 people
and the biggest chunk of the folks are going to be laid off.
Or the people who do the audits of the billionaires and the
millionaires and the corporations.
And so once again, Elon Musk and the people standing behind
Donald Trump on Inauguration Day are going to get off because the
IRS just had its enforcement powers, its audit powers
absolutely gutted. That same day, on February 19th,
you start to receive word that advertising on Elon Musk's
platform is starting to grow again.
And the reporting on February 19th indicates that American
companies have come to the collective decision that they
need to keep advertising on Elon Musk's platform because Elon
Musk has so much regulatory power inside the federal
government that they need to make sure that they're paying
Musk through Twitter and through X so that if they ultimately
need something from the federal government, they can get it.
This again, is why we have never, ever in the history of
this country allowed for the richest man in the world,
somebody who controls major companies, to also have an
official position inside the government.
Because of course, of course, it opens up these clear avenues
where people are going to do business with him privately, to
try to Curry favor with him publicly.
I'm not done. It just keeps going.
The next day on February 20th, the CDC's Advisory Committee on
Immunization Practices monthly meeting is canceled and not
rescheduled. And so we were very worried that
Robert F Kennedy Junior, who makes money off of his attacks
on vaccines, would continue those attacks when he took over
HHS. Because if faith in vaccines
continues to plummet, it is very likely that RFK junior will make
money. Why?
Because the not-for-profit that he will likely return to, the
company they will return to after he leaves, makes money as
vaccine misinformation spreads. And he also continues to collect
fees for referring cases to a company that handles claims of
personal injury due to vaccines. And so when the CDC's advisory
committee on amortization Practices is cancelled, it is a
clear indication that, yes, this campaign of assault on vaccines
is going to continue. Which, not surprisingly, is
likely to make RFK Junior even more money.
On February 26th, we see Trump's MAGA hats that are for sale on
his website displayed in the Oval Office.
And it's just a reminder that so many people inside Trump's
universe continue to sell merchandise on the side in order
to make money. Donald Trump has always done
this and we've just kind of accepted it even though it is a
kind of corruption in and of itself.
But Cash Patel, the director of the FBI, is still sent selling
cash branded merchandise even while he's going to run the FBI.
Elon Musk and others are selling doge merchandise.
So as they trumpet their brand inside the government, they're
making money off their brand outside of the government.
On February 26th may be the third most significant of brazen
corruption happens. News breaks that Elon Musk is
just going to have the FAA cancel a contract with Verizon
that has been in the works for years and instead just
substitute in Starlink for Verizon.
Just extraordinary that this is happening in Plainview of
everybody. Elon Musk takes his private
company, uses his access to government to just shove out of
the way his competitors and instead insert himself and his
company. Again, we've never seen this
ever before in American history. Now it's happening on a daily
basis. And now we get to this week.
This week, Wired reports that guests are paying millions of
dollars to dine with Donald Trump at Mar A Lago and business
leaders are being targeted with advertisements that sell access
to a one-on-one meeting with the President of the United States
for $5,000,000. Come on.
Like, seriously, there's advertisements that say if
you're a business CEO and you pay $5,000,000 to Donald Trump,
you can get a meeting with him. Like, this isn't OK.
And yet, because it happens every single day, Every single
day, they're asking for us to pretend that this is normal.
This is just six weeks. It's just six weeks.
And the last thing on the list is an offer to meet with the
president for $1,000,000 or $5 million.
If any previous president had sent out an advertisement
suggesting that you can meet with them for a payment to them
of 1,000,000 to $5,000,000, in and of itself we would deem that
to be unacceptable. But Donald Trump and Elon Musk
believe that because they have arranged this dizzying pace of
corruption in which not a day goes by in which something
doesn't happen inside our government, in which Elon Musk
or Donald Trump use their power in order to rig the rules to
enrich themselves, that we are all going to feel that it's
normal. This is how democracies die.
Democracies die when the very powerful people steal from us so
regularly, so openly, so unapologetically, that we come
to believe that it's normal. And listen, I understand that
many Americans may think that all of this stuff just used to
happen quietly. And the only difference is that
Trump and Musk are just putting it all out in the open.
And I'm not saying that there haven't been instances of
corruption. Democrats and Republicans in
this body have been accused of and convicted of acts of
corruption. It has been a fact of life in
American politics for a long time.
But never before has the corruption happened this openly
or this frequently. And so I lay it all out for you
this afternoon in the hopes that it is not too late for us to
decide to stand up as a body and as a nation to say that this
isn't OK. The Trump meme coin is not OK.
It's not OK for people who have interests before the federal
government to be able to anonymously funnel money to the
president of the United States. It's not OK for Elon Musk to
have access to Department of Labor enforcement data against
him or his competitors that nobody else gets access to.
It's not OK to just cancel contracts that we're going to
the Musk's competitors and substitute in his own business
just because he has the ability to do it as a friend of Donald
Trump. Like the rule of law matters,
Doing things by the rules matter.
This level of corruption was not occurring behind the scenes
prior. It is not just that the cover
got pulled off of it all. And it's our decision as a body
and as a country to decide not to normalize this scale of
corruption. I yield the floor.
Hey, thank you so much for listening today.
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