Republican New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu said billionaire businessman Elon Musk is too wealthy to have a conflict of interest by advising President-elect Donald Trump and working in the upcoming administration.
Some Democrats and Trump critics have suggested the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX and owner of social platform X, could benefit financially or competitively due to his ties to Trump.
The president-elect last month said Musk and former GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy will lead a new unofficial "Department of Government Efficiency" that will aim to cut federal spending.
CNN "State of the Union" host Dana Bash on Sunday asked Sununu whether he saw a conflict of interest with Musk considering the businessman "has billions of dollars tied up in government contracts."
"Everyone has a conflict of interest at some level," said Sununu, who then was told Musk’s conflict was "a pretty big one."
"True. The guy's worth $450 billion as of today and this month. So I don't think he's doing it for the money," Sununu said. "He's doing it for the bigger project and the bigger vision of America.
"He doesn't need the dollars. He really doesn't. So it's not about, Oh, if I get involved in this, I will get another little contract here or there.
"That's nothing to him. So I like the fact that he's — in a way, he's so rich, he's so removed from the potential financial influence of it."
The governor said he respected Musk's value to Trump.
"And as much as people say, Well, Elon is a billionaire outsider, first, I don't mind that they're billionaires. I like people that are successful," Sununu said. "Where the difference is whether they're billionaire or broke, I'd rather have someone successful. And I like that it's an outsider and an engineer, and not a wild politician and not looking for anything out of the game."
A one-time Trump critic, Sununu said he's "cautiously optimistic" regarding the upcoming administration.
"No. 1, I don't think he [Trump] understood how Congress really fundamentally worked in 2017 and 2018," Sununu told Bash.
"And the reasons Republicans lost in 2018, because they talked a big game and got nothing done. I think there's a different team he's surrounded himself with, a little more professional of a team within the White House itself.
"He's built a lot of better coalitions. He's more established in terms of the political aspects of what he wants to do on the Hill."
The Associated Press contributed to this story.
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Charlie McCarthy, a writer/editor at Newsmax, has nearly 40 years of experience covering news, sports, and politics.
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