Wall Road Journal reporter Vivian Salama stated Elon Musk is “positively enjoying a dangerous sport” by getting forward of Donald Trump to tank a authorities funding invoice.

Democrats and different critics began calling Musk Trump’s “shadow president” on Wednesday after the billionaire Tesla CEO railed repeatedly in opposition to the invoice in a social media spree, earlier than the president-elect finally weighed in, probably delivering a deadly blow to the bipartisan deal negotiated by Home Speaker Mike Johnson (Republican, Louisiana).

“It’s extremely dangerous,” Salama, a nationwide politics reporter who lined the White Home throughout Trump’s first administration, stated of Musk’s manoeuvring on CNN’s OutFront on Wednesday.

“And amazingly, his advisors have been remarkably silent on why it took Donald Trump, and even Vice President-elect JD Vance, so lengthy to weigh in on this subject,” she continued. “Whereas Elon Musk … was tweeting all day lengthy about this, as was Vivek Ramaswamy.”

Musk reportedly spent greater than 1 / 4 of a billion {dollars} to assist elect Trump. The president-elect subsequently tapped Musk, together with entrepreneur and former Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, to steer a brand new non-government advisory group, the Division of Authorities Effectivity (DOGE).

“It is extremely uncommon to see shut advisors to Donald Trump getting forward of him on crucial points like this,” Salama stated.

She stated it wasn’t clear if Musk and Ramaswamy had coordinated prematurely with Trump earlier than talking out so vocally in opposition to the funding invoice.

“Advisers informed us that they did sort of obtain Trump’s blessing, that they had been on the identical web page, however they actually couldn’t give way more of a proof as to why Elon Musk was simply sort of going full-throated, , rejection of the invoice so early on, with out us listening to from Trump,” she stated.

“And so he’s positively enjoying a dangerous sport. Donald Trump sometimes likes to sort of be his personal spokesman,” she added. “We all know that. I occurred to cowl his first White Home, and so we noticed that play out.”

CNN’s Erin Burnett likened Musk’s state of affairs to “when Icarus flew too near the solar.”

Many have speculated that Musk is hogging the highlight in a approach that’s positive to annoy Trump, and that’s already reportedly rankling a few of Trump’s advisers.