Musk's summit dialogue with Trump: What did they both talk about

Compiled by Deng Tong, Golden Finance, Source: BBC

August 13, 2024, is a day that can be recorded in Twitter's history. Trump and Musk made a joint appearance on Twitter Space, with over 1 million people reportedly participating in the Space event. However, there was a small incident at the beginning of their conversation. Twitter seemed to be facing technical issues, and users reported difficulties accessing the event. X platform data showed that 2 million people were watching Trump and Musk's live interview but couldn't display the live details. In response, Musk tweeted, 'X seems to have experienced a large-scale DDOS attack,' referring to a distributed denial-of-service network attack. He also stated, 'Earlier today, we tested the system with 8 million simultaneous listeners.'

But the flaws do not hide the beauty. The two of them talked about the assassination attempt on Trump, illegal immigration, Biden's withdrawal from the election, Harris refusing interviews, wanting to cancel the Department of Education, criticizing the California governor, electric vehicle policies, etc. on Space.

Jinse Finance has compiled the content of the dialogue between the two giants as follows, to feast the readers.

Musk: Cyber-attack Shows Some Americans Oppose Trump

After the restoration of Twitter Space, Musk first mentioned distributed denial of service, saying that it "saturates all of our data lines." The so-called cyber attack shows that there are people in the United States who oppose listening to Trump's opinions. The interview will be informal to help "independent voters who are open-minded and trying to make up their minds."

Trump: Congratulations to Musk, and mentioning the assassination incident

Then I heard Trump's voice. ** Trump first congratulated Musk for 'breaking all records' because of the large number of audience members for this event. It is not clear what records he is referring to. **

Currently, the interface of X shows approximately 1 million listeners.

Elon first asked Trump about the assassination attempt, when Trump was shot at a rally in Pennsylvania.

Trump smiled and said, "It's not pleasant," and then went on to describe his experience in detail.

Trump: Hopes interviews will help gain greater political momentum

Elon Musk opened by saying that this was to give open-minded voters a chance to understand what it feels like to talk to Donald Trump. But Musk is biased towards either side - his tone clearly indicates his support for Trump, and he once again confirms his support for him. The Twitter space shows Trump as the host and Musk as the co-host, so we know who holds the power.

Trump hopes this interview will help him gain more momentum after President Biden's withdrawal and Vice President Kamala Harris reviving the Democratic Party base. However, Musk had to apologize for such a late and awkward start. So there is no room for victory.

At the Republican National Convention, we were told that Trump had changed and would adopt a new tone of unity. This has not been fully achieved.

Trump also said he may never talk about assassination attempts again, but it is the only issue he has discussed in depth so far.

Trump said this makes him believe in God more than ever before - undoubtedly a heavenly sound for his religious followers.

Trump also praised the female agent who accompanied him on stage that day. Musk remained silent on the fact that the agent received a lot of criticism on X, including Musk himself. He questioned her ability and why she was hired.

How many illegal immigrants entered the United States during Biden's presidency?

Trump claims that he has shifted his focus to immigration, which was one of his main campaign issues that helped him kick off his 2016 presidential campaign.

This Republican presidential candidate claims, without providing evidence, that immigrants are coming from 'mental hospitals' around the world.

"Within a month, millions of people flocked in, and she stood up pretending to do something," he was referring to Kamala Harris. He claimed that there are 20 million illegal immigrants in the United States.

During President Biden's tenure, it is impossible to know exactly how many illegal immigrants have crossed the southern border of the United States into the country, but official data shows that the actual number is lower than the number claimed by Trump before.

The U.S. Customs and Border Protection stated that since January 2021, U.S. law enforcement officers have had 10.5 million encounters with illegal immigrants, with over 8 million people crossing the southern border.

It is worth noting that the same person may attempt to cross the border multiple times.

Compared with the four years of Donald Trump's presidency, this figure has increased significantly overall, setting the highest record of any US government in power.

Since Biden's introduction of restrictions on asylum seekers at the beginning of June, the number of people arrested for illegally crossing the southern border has sharply decreased.

In July, US border patrol agents arrested about 57,000 immigrants at the border, the lowest record since September 2020.

Compared to December, this number dropped significantly, when about 250,000 immigrants were arrested while crossing the border.

Trump will return to the city of Butler, which was shot.

Trump said he plans to return to Butler, Pennsylvania to attend another campaign event because the previous campaign event was abruptly ended by gunshots.

Donald Trump joked that he would start Butler's next speech with "as I said..."

"Before you get rudely interrupted," Elon Musk joked.

Trump accuses Biden of invading Ukraine

Trump claimed that Russia would not have invaded Ukraine if it weren't for Biden.

Musk did not refute the claim and told Trump that he had made a 'very good point'

"I get along very well with Putin, he respects me," Trump said, adding that he used to talk to Putin frequently in the past.

He then described an experience in which he allegedly advised Putin not to invade Ukraine.

"We will talk about Ukraine. This is the jewel of his palm. But I told him not to do it," he claimed.

"He said 'no way', I said 'yes you can'," Trump said.

Trump has always said he "understands" Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

“They are both smart and fierce,” he said.

"When they saw Kamala or the drowsy Joe, they could hardly believe it," he said, mispronouncing the vice president's name.

Trump wants an Iron Dome defense system

"Why shouldn't we have the Iron Dome defense system? Israel has one," Trump said.

His comment refers to Israel's missile defense system, which can destroy short-range weapons fired at the country.

The Iron Dome defense system was developed after the 2006 conflict between Israel and the southern Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.

It was created with the support of some American companies by the Israeli company Rafael Advanced Defense Systems and the Israeli Aerospace Industries.

Trump: Biden's withdrawal is a coup

This is very much like Donald Trump expressing his long list of grievances to Elon Musk, who listens patiently and sympathetically.

He mourned the withdrawal of President Biden again and apparently wanted a rematch with Biden.

He said, "This is a coup, this is an American president's coup," referring to Kamala Harris taking Joe Biden's place in this election.

Earlier he called it unconstitutional. These are all inaccurate, but interestingly, Trump has never accepted the fact that he lost to Joe Biden in the 2020 election.

This may be the closest we've come to seeing him admit the truth: Biden legitimately won the White House.

Trump criticized Harris for not accepting more interviews

Donald Trump criticized Kamala Harris for not having done any major interviews since she became the Democratic Party's presidential nominee, just as he says he is doing now.

“It's great to have such a forum,” Trump said.

When it comes to Biden, he said, 'It's very sad when you think of someone who makes a living out of it and can't answer questions or is afraid to be interviewed,' even though the president was interviewed by ABC News a few days ago.

Musk continues to claim that Harris will not accept his interview.

Although Harris has been holding large rallies regularly, she has not yet accepted any major media interviews since running for president.

Harris Campaign Team: Musk is Trump's "running dog"

During the interview, Harris-Wholz's campaign team issued a fundraising appeal to supporters.

The theme is: "Tonight, the two worst people you know will be online."

"Musk's promise to donate millions of dollars to help Trump's reelection is not enough. He is using the platform he purchased - one of the world's largest social media websites - to spread Trump's crazy and hateful agenda to millions of users," the campaign email claimed, emphasizing the word "millions" in italics. It called Musk a "lackey" of Trump.

Meanwhile, Harris-Waltz's campaign team continued to attack him using Trump's own social media platform, Truth Social, in this interview.

Is Trump's tax cut the largest tax cut in history?

Trump claimed that in his conversation with Musk, he said his government provided the largest tax cuts ever for the American people.

Note: Donald Trump did implement significant tax cuts during his presidency, but they were not the largest tax cuts in history. Trump's Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 comprehensively reduced taxes. Unless the next administration extends these measures, they will expire in 2025.

According to the analysis of the independent and responsible Federal Budget Committee, Trump's external tax cuts are the eighth largest tax cut calculated as a percentage of GDP since 1918, and the fourth largest tax cut calculated in US dollars since 1940 (adjusted for inflation).

Although Trump did not introduce the overall largest tax reduction measure, he did pass the largest corporate tax reduction measure in US history. The 2017 law reduced this rate from 35% to 21%.

This is higher than the tax cuts passed during Ronald Reagan's presidency in the 1980s, when the tax rate dropped from 46% to 34%.

At the end of June, Trump told Bloomberg that he supports further reducing the corporate tax rate from the current 21% to 15%.

Trump wants to abolish the Department of Education

"I want to close the Department of Education and transfer education back to the states," Trump said, calling for the elimination of federal agencies.

He said, compared to peers around the world, American students are falling behind.

He said, "Cancelling the Ministry of Education has many benefits," and claimed that this would reduce education costs by half.

This plan is similar to the 2025 project, which is a conservative wish list that the Trump campaign team has been unwilling to accept.

It also reflects the Republican Party platform adopted at last month's national convention.

Trump Criticizes California Governor

Donald Trump harshly criticized California leadership, calling it "poorly managed."

He also gave a derogatory nickname to California Governor Gavin Newsom in his typical style and criticized his performance in education.

But California is a Democratic state with the right to abortion and strict gun control laws, so it is not surprising that it has been criticized by Donald Trump.

Governor Gavin Newsom also fearlessly and outspokenly expressed his views on Donald Trump, previously describing him as 'a bit mentally deranged'.

Is Musk seeking a position in the Trump administration?

In the latter part of this interview, Elon Musk seems to be striving for a position in the Trump administration.

He is willing to help Trump hold the government accountable for spending, possibly to help establish a government deficit committee. Trump said he hopes Musk will be involved in it.

American media reported back in May that Trump has been considering offering Musk a government advisory position if he wins.

During this interview, Musk has been consistently praising Trump and agreeing with his views, which may be mutual: Trump's interview, Musk's very public interview.

How many miles of border wall did Trump build?

Trump claimed: Trump told Musk that he built hundreds of miles of wall to protect the southern border while serving as president.

Note: The length of the border wall built during President Trump's term depends on the object you measure, but even including new sections as well as replaced or reinforced sections, the total length is less than 500 miles. A report from U.S. Customs and Border Protection states that the total length is 458 miles (external). However, during Trump's presidency, only 85 miles of completely new wall segments were built.

The rest either needs to be replaced or reinforced with existing obstacles.

As President Trump's term is drawing to a close, the BBC has investigated the status of the border wall.

After President Biden took office, the construction was suspended, but last year his administration allowed the construction of a wall in the southern part of Texas to stop the increasing number of immigrants.

Musk talks about climate, Trump turns to 'nuclear warming'

Musk said he hopes to create a positive future and talked about addressing global warming, as well as the expected rise of the sea level by one-eighth of an inch in the next few hundred years.

He seems to be advocating for the transition to renewable energy that the Democratic Party has been pushing for years.

Donald Trump: The biggest threat is not global warming. He says it's nuclear warming.

Musk smiled.

Trump: "No, really."

Trump said there are five countries with nuclear capabilities. In fact, there are nine: the United States, the United Kingdom, Israel, France, Russia, China, Pakistan, India, and North Korea.

Trump criticizes Harris' running mate for proposing a sanitary pad bill

Trump claimed that Harris's running mate, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, signed a law authorizing schools to place sanitary pads in men's restrooms in public schools.

The state law enacted last year does not specifically specify which restrooms can use sanitary tampons. It only says that sanitary tampons should be provided to anyone who menstruates.

Republicans have sharply criticized the law, calling it "sanitary pad Tim".

Meanwhile, Waltz accepted the nickname and expressed pride in his work of providing free menstrual products for himself.

Electric Vehicle Policy Reversal

**Former President Trump said at a rally last weekend that after Elon Musk supported his presidential campaign, he had 'no choice' but to change his attitude towards electric cars. He told the audience, 'I support electric cars, I have to support them, because Elon strongly supports me.'

In this interview, Trump talked about TSL cars and praised the technology. Musk also told Trump that he hopes to transition to sustainable energy.

At the Republican National Convention, Trump vowed to significantly cut back on regulations put in place by President Biden to promote the widespread adoption of electric vehicles on his first day in office.

Due to concerns about the employment of American auto workers, he opposes a large-scale shift to electric cars. However, he also stated that electric cars themselves are "expensive" and have "insufficient range." However, according to an article in The Washington Post in 2015, this did not prevent him from owning an electric car. The article quoted his campaign team as saying that one of the two American cars in his motorcade at the time was a TSL.

Musk is backing Trump again, but some Tesla fans and customers are not happy about it.

Last week, a German company announced that it would stop purchasing TSL cars for its company fleet due to Musk's remarks being inconsistent with the position represented by TSL.

Twitter Space is Trump's "safe space"

Rather than calling it an interview, it was more like a casual conversation - Musk was very complimentary and did not refute some baseless claims made by Donald Trump regarding immigration.

He often accuses other countries of deliberately sending violent and bad criminals without any evidence.

Musk did indeed express some slightly dissenting views, saying that immigration might be a good thing, but he quickly acquiesced to Trump's viewpoint.

Immigration is the strongest issue for Trump in the minds of voters. He follows Kamala Harris in this regard, calling her a failed "border czar," although as vice president, her responsibilities are more focused on the driving factors of Central American immigration.

On Musk's Political Preferences

I wonder if independent voters have gained new insights into Donald Trump so far—if that is their goal.

Those who love him will still love him, and vice versa. But perhaps we have gained a better understanding of Elon Musk.

He said he likes strong leaders, and when Trump talked affectionately about North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, Musk said it would be cool to meet Trump.

Trump and his vice presidential candidate JD Vance have given many interviews, emphasizing that Harris and Walz have not done so yet.

Trump said that Kamala Harris will never talk to Musk like this again, even though it's not an interview anyway.

Given Musk's calling Harris a "far-left radical" and wholeheartedly supporting Trump, he clearly won't be as lenient with her as he is with Trump.

Nature of the Interview: Musk Does Major Promotion for Trump

Musk has briefly stated that he usually doesn't care about politics, but also mentioned that he once lined up to shake hands with Barack Obama.

He stuttered and said that America is at a crossroads, but before saying that he thinks independent voters should vote for Donald Trump, he did not elaborate much on this.

Therefore, this proves that Musk is not interviewing a major political candidate, but rather using his platform to make a major publicity for Trump.

The listening rate of Space is not as good as that of previous big events

About half an hour after the chat started, X's own data showed that 1.2 million people were listening to the live conversation.

By contrast, when Musk helped launch Ron DeSantis' presidential campaign on Twitter Spaces last year, the livestream had the most listeners, with about 300,000 people.

Compared to the television broadcasts of other important events during this election period, today's digital ones are insignificant.

According to Nielsen's ratings agency, over 51 million people watched the debate between Trump and President Joe Biden in June.

Last month, 28 million people watched Trump's speech at the Republican National Convention.