Tech billionaire and former White House adviser Elon Musk on Tuesday criticized a budget bill backed by congressional Republicans and President Donald Trump, drawing a response from the administration.
In a post on X, Musk said the bill will cause the U.S. budget deficit to skyrocket.
“I’m sorry, but I just can’t stand it anymore,” he wrote in a post on X. “This massive, outrageous, pork-filled Congressional spending bill is a disgusting abomination. Shame on those who voted for it: you know you did wrong. You know it.”
In a follow-up post, Musk said that the budget reconciliation package, which is called the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, “will massively increase the already gigantic budget deficit to $2.5 trillion (!!!) and burden America citizens with crushingly unsustainable debt.”
The critical comments come just days after Musk departed the administration as leader of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), a task force designed to target fraud, waste, and abuse in the federal government.
Musk’s post appeared to draw on estimates from the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget that were released in May, saying that the bill could add $2.5 trillion to the deficit over the coming decade. It would also add $3.1 trillion to the national debt including interest, according to the estimate.
When asked about Musk’s comments, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt indicated that the Trump administration won’t back off supporting the bill.
“Look, the president already knows where Elon Musk stood on this bill. It doesn’t change the president’s opinion,“ she told reporters Tuesday. ”This is one big beautiful bill, and he’s sticking to it.”
The Republican-backed bill passed in the House of Representatives last month by a single vote, with all Democrats opposed, and is now being considered by the Senate. Some GOP senators have indicated they may not support the measure, which would cut taxes, increase military and border spending, and scale back on Medicaid.
Republican leaders on Tuesday responded to Musk’s comment, with House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) telling reporters that Musk “is terribly wrong” about the measure and that he spoke with him over the phone about the legislation.
“I extolled all the virtues of the bill, and he seemed to understand that. We had a very friendly conversation about it,” Johnson said.
The House speaker suggested to reporters that Musk may be opposed to the bill because it contains language that terminates electric vehicle tax credits.
“I know that the EV mandate is very important to him; that is going away because the government should not be subsidizing these things as part of the Green New Deal,” Johnson said. “I know that has an effect on his business and I lament that. We talked about the ramp down period on that and how that should be duly considered by Congress.”
Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) said Tuesday the concerns raised by the Tesla CEO appear to be based on estimates from the Congressional Budget Office that Republicans have contested.
The Congressional Budget Office has also said that it would increase the deficit by an estimated $3.8 trillion over 10 years, but that figure has been rebutted by the White House.
“In making its projections, the CBO [Congressional Budget Office] has refused to account for—or ‘score’ as they say in CBO lingo—any of the new revenues from the Trump reciprocal tariffs,” White House adviser Peter Navarro said in a statement on May 28.
Other White House officials have said that some critics of the bill are misguided and that it will save more than $1.6 trillion in mandatory spending.
“The bill saves more than 1.6 TRILLION in mandatory spending, including the largest-ever welfare reform. A remarkable achievement,“ Trump administration adviser Stephen Miller said in the statement. ”I’ve also seen claims the bill increases the deficit. This lie is based on a CBO accounting gimmick.”
As Musk’s time in the White House ended, the Tesla CEO and Trump appeared in a joint news conference in the Oval Office last week. Trump praised Musk, who was due to leave because his time as a special government employee ended, for his work with DOGE.
Musk was interviewed by CBS News on Sunday and was asked about his time in the government. He said that DOGE became a “whipping boy” in Washington for things that his task force wasn’t involved in.
At one point in the interview, Musk said that he doesn’t always agree with the Trump administration’s policies and wants a smaller government.
“It’s not like I agree with everything the administration does,” he said, but added that he agrees “with much of what the administration does.”
“But it’s difficult for me to bring that up in an interview because then it creates a bone of contention,” he said. “So then, I’m a little stuck in a bind, where I’m like, well, I don’t want to, you know, speak up against the administration, but I also don’t want to take responsibility for everything the administration’s doing.”
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