President Donald Trump told Newsmax's Greg Kelly during an exclusive interview that he believes leftist billionaires are funding violent attacks aimed at Elon Musk and Tesla.
Trump commended White House senior adviser Musk as a "wonderful patriot" during an interview with Newsmax on Tuesday, adding that not one time has the Tesla and SpaceX chief executive ever asked him for a favor.
Further, Trump said he believes billionaire liberals who were behind his criminal trials also are responsible for the many attacks on Tesla cars, Cybertrucks, dealerships, and charging stations across the country.
"I believe that that is part of it. Yeah, there are some of them that were involved with my trials that were, I think, were probably involved with that also," Trump said after being asked whether he had heard that Democrat megadonor George Soros or others were involved in funding the violence.
The president invited "Greg Kelly Reports" to the White House on Tuesday for a lengthy and wide-ranging interview.
Trump applauded the work being done by Musk's Department of Government Efficiency.
"And he's basically a patriot," Trump said of Musk, telling Kelly that he "didn't know [Musk] very well before" the presidential campaign, "hardly at all," he said. "And he's essentially a patriot. He's a wonderful patriot; he loves the country.
"But he's never asked me — think of this; and he's got plenty of right to, I guess; doesn't mean I'm gonna do it; I probably won't — but he's never asked me for a favor.
"As an example, I just got rid of the electric car mandate. ... And he never came to me and said, 'Could you do me a favor? Don't do that?' You know, he's a legitimate guy, and he's doing this because it's for the good of the country. We are finding hundreds of billions of dollars in fraud," Trump said.
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Mark Swanson ✉
Mark Swanson, a Newsmax writer and editor, has nearly three decades of experience covering news, culture and politics.
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