Rep. Jim Clyburn Slams Elon Musk’s Trump Administration Role: ‘Government is Not a Toy’ | Video
Elon Musk might be an “astute businessman,” Rep. Jim Clyburn told CNN’s Victor Blackwell Saturday. But that doesn’t mean his role in the incoming Trump Administration was earned. “Government is not a toy,” Clyburn insisted.
“He’s been a very astute businessman, but he is not good at government,” Clyburn said, “and he ought to leave that alone. Look, this debate would have been done 24 hours earlier if he had not taken the government as a toy of his.”
“One hundred tweets in a few hours against legislation to help children, keep our farmers in business, to recover communities from disasters — why would you do that? Government is not a toy,” Clyburn said.
“I think Elon Musk and a few others look upon this as some kind of a game that they want to play,” he continued. “We are playing with people’s lives here, and we as elected officials ought not be giving up our responsibilities to someone that was never been elected to anything. No matter how rich he is, that doesn’t give him license to practice in a field that many of us have been in most of our lives.”
Musk has most recently angered many after he rejected a spending bill unveiled by House Republicans Wednesday. Since he’s not an elected official, Musk’s rejection came by way of X, formerly Twitter, where he spent hours firing off tweets against the legislation. His tweets caught the attention of President-elect Donald Trump and JD Vance, who told House Republicans to rework the bill.
The result was a significantly slimmed-down version of the spending bill the House had attempted to pass. Among other things, the new bill cut nearly $200 million in funding for the Gabriella Miller Kids First Pediatric Research Program. The program was established in 2014 in honor of Miller, a 10-year-old who died from cancer the year before. The original fund lasted 10 years and was up for renewal in 2024. The program was funded in the bill presented by Republicans Wednesday.
Musk appeared thrilled with Thursday’s bill. He shared a photo of the two bills side by side on X and wrote, “Yesterday’s bill vs today’s bill” with a laughing emoji.
The House ultimately rejected the new bill by 174-235 on Thursday night, with nearly 30 Republicans joining Democrats in voting against it. JD Vance told reporters at the White House the bill failed “because [Democrats] didn’t want to give the president negotiating leverage during the first year of his new term.”
“They’ve asked for a shutdown,” he said. “That’s exactly what they’re going to get.”
House Republican Leader Steve Scalise also said Thursday that the GOP will not attempt to bring the same bill back to a vote.
The House and Senate eventually passed a newer version of the bill. The final bill does not authorize funding for the pediatric cancer research program, and also dropped protections for Americans who have their food stamps stolen, does not include a bipartisan bill that would criminalize revenge porn, removed a measure that would have restricted American investment in China, and killed a plan to give Washington, D.C., greater control over RFK Field, a move that would have allowed the Commanders to return to the city.
You can watch the clip from Rep. Clyburn’s interview in the video above.
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