{"id":2142,"date":"2026-02-14T07:40:43","date_gmt":"2026-02-14T07:40:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/firearmgiveawayfinder.com\/?p=2142"},"modified":"2026-02-14T07:40:43","modified_gmt":"2026-02-14T07:40:43","slug":"he-never-really-left-mother-jones","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/firearmgiveawayfinder.com\/?p=2142","title":{"rendered":"He Never Really Left.) \u2013 Mother Jones"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div id=\"\">\n<div class=\"hero is-image \">\n\t<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text\"><span class=\"media-caption\">Elon Musk looks on as US President Donald Trump speaks at the US-Saudi Investment Forum at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, DC on November 19, 2025. <\/span><span class=\"media-credit\">BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI\/AFP\/Getty<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"mj-text-cta\">Get your news from a source that\u2019s not owned and controlled by oligarchs. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.motherjones.com\/newsletters\/?mj_oac=Article_Top_No_Oligarchs\" data-ga-category=\"TopOfArticle\" data-ga-label=\"NewsletterPromoCovid\" data-ga-action=\"click|https:\/\/www.motherjones.com\/newsletters\/?mj_oac=Article_Top_Support\">Sign up for the free <em>Mother Jones Daily<\/em>.<\/a><\/div>\n<p><span class=\"section-lead\">Elon Musk, <\/span>who formally <a href=\"https:\/\/www.motherjones.com\/politics\/2025\/06\/musk-doge-leaves-dc-media-fail\/\">distanced<\/a> himself from the White House last year, hasn\u2019t stopped trying to influence American politics.<\/p>\n<p>Musk took a step away from the Department of Government Efficiency\u2014the agency he crafted and wielded against long-held federal spending practices. But, contrary to what some expected, that didn\u2019t signal indefinite distance from Republican politics for the South African-born, Texas-voting centibillionaire. To the contrary, campaign finance records and his own social media profiles indicate that he\u2019s ready to wield power whenever, wherever.<\/p>\n<p>His public clash with President Donald Trump also doesn\u2019t appear to be <a href=\"https:\/\/people.com\/donald-trump-and-elon-musk-have-lovely-dinner-at-mar-a-lago-after-feud-11878878\">sticking<\/a>. Musk has <a href=\"https:\/\/people.com\/donald-trump-and-elon-musk-have-lovely-dinner-at-mar-a-lago-after-feud-11878878\">dined<\/a> with the president and first lady Melania Trump and, weeks ago, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/pictures\/mar-a-lago-wedding-album-photos-ceremony-dan-scavino-marries-erin-elmore-2026-02-01\/\">attended<\/a> the wedding of Dan Scavino, White House deputy chief of staff, at Mar-a-Lago alongside prominent administration officials.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>He\u2019s also been ceaselessly posting political commentary and recommendations on X, which he owns. Including frequent posts about the Epstein files, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/technology\/2026\/jan\/30\/elon-musk-epstein-files-island-visits\">which he is in<\/a> but has attempted to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/01\/30\/us\/elon-musk-epstein-emails.html\">distance himself from<\/a>. <\/p>\n<p>One of his <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/elonmusk\/status\/2020632617029447757\">main<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/BasedMikeLee\/status\/2020607299761623393\">targets<\/a> of late <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/elonmusk\/status\/2021302488956272732\">has been<\/a> the SAVE Act, Republican <a href=\"https:\/\/www.motherjones.com\/politics\/2026\/02\/trump-wants-to-take-over-elections-save-act-voter-id-suppression\/\">legislation<\/a> that, if both houses of Congress pass it, could disenfranchise tens of millions of potential voters and uniquely target women through new voter ID requirements.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Republicans have been taking notice. <\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/2026\/01\/28\/elon-musk-gop-comeback-00751572\">According<\/a> to <em>Politico<\/em>: <\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>The campaign has driven a huge volume of calls to member offices, according to two aides granted anonymity to discuss internal matters, forcing Republican after Republican to publicly state their support for the legislation.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>After <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2025\/02\/01\/politics\/elon-musk-2024-election-spending-millions\">spending<\/a> more than $290 million to get Trump and other Republicans elected in 2024 cycle, Musk claimed in May that he\u2019d be cutting back. \u201cIn terms of political spending, I\u2019m going to do a lot less in the future,\u201d he said in an interview with <em>Bloomberg News<\/em> at the time. \u201cIf I see a reason to do political spending in the future, I will do it. I do not currently see a reason.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>His announcement came after <a href=\"https:\/\/pbswisconsin.org\/news-item\/musks-plan-to-pull-back-from-politics-follows-flop-in-wisconsin-court-election\/\">pouring<\/a> money into the high-profile Wisconsin Supreme Court election\u2014to no avail.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Seems like he found a reason.<\/p>\n<p>Musk gave $20 million to the two political groups by the end of 2025. With the midterms revving up, Republicans are <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/2026\/01\/28\/elon-musk-gop-comeback-00751572\">considering<\/a> what an influx of money from Musk, a divisive character due to his history of slashing government funding that affected Americans across the political spectrum, could do for their campaigns.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Talking to <em>Politico<\/em>, Rep. Carlos Gimenez (R-Fla.) worried about how midterms tend to be rough for the president\u2019s party.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHistory is not on our side,\u201d Gimenez said. \u201cWe\u2019ll take any and all help possible to reverse that trend in history, because I think it\u2019s important for the Republican Party.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.motherjones.com\/politics\/2026\/02\/elon-is-back-edit-he-never-really-left\/\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Elon Musk looks on as US President Donald Trump speaks at the US-Saudi Investment Forum at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, DC on November 19, 2025. BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI\/AFP\/Getty Get your news from a source that\u2019s not owned and controlled by oligarchs. Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2143,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2142","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-usa-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/firearmgiveawayfinder.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2142","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/firearmgiveawayfinder.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/firearmgiveawayfinder.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/firearmgiveawayfinder.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/firearmgiveawayfinder.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2142"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/firearmgiveawayfinder.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2142\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/firearmgiveawayfinder.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2143"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/firearmgiveawayfinder.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2142"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/firearmgiveawayfinder.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2142"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/firearmgiveawayfinder.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2142"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}