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History will not be kind to Elon Musk, nor should it be. True, he is one of the most brilliant and successful business leaders ever. But he’s also one of the most demented, destructive, ineffective and heartless men who ever walked the planet. Nero only played the fiddle while Rome burned. Musk set the fires.

First, to his credit, when everybody considered EV’s a joke, he created TESLA, the most beautiful and most dependable electric car on the road. In 2002, when NASA was floundering and the United States was losing our edge in space, Musk created SpaceX – which is now the world’s dominant space launch provider, eclipsing all other private and national programs. In 2019, SpaceX launched Starlink, expanding internet access to the most remote areas of the globe and providing Ukraine the network its military still depends on.

He did all that good stuff. He became the wealthiest person on earth. Then, maybe, the drugs kicked in. Whatever happened, then Elon Musk went nuts.

It started with Twitter. Remember when Twitter was everybody’s home online? With its friendly little blue bird logo, more than 100 million users, and 240 million “tweets” a day, it was the safest, quickest way to engage on issues of the day. Then, in 2022, Musk bought it, renamed it and destroyed it, turning Twitter into a total right-wing, conspiratorial cesspool – on which the wackiest, most conspiratorial voice, popping up dozens of times a day, is Musk himself.

Then, with 2024 looming, Elon discovered politics. He could have supported the president who made the manufacture of EV’s a national priority and showered billions of dollars on the electric car industry. Instead, he cynically decided to support the number one enemy of electric cars, the man who calls EV’s a “Marxist hoax.” Why? Because he figured Donald Trump was for sale and Joe Biden and Kamala Harris were not.

Musk got that right. After shoveling $250 million into Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign (by far the biggest campaign contribution ever, but still chump change for Musk), Elon quickly became Trump’s BFF: dinners at Mar-a-Lago, rides on Air Force One, meetings with foreign leaders. And then the big pay-off: a new government agency, the Department of Government Efficiency, or “DOGE” – with Musk the head of it for what will be remembered as “130 days from Hell.”

By any measure, Musk’s 130-day DOGE tenure was both a total failure and a total disaster.

A total failure. Musk initially vowed to cut $2 trillion in “wasteful” spending. He later cut that goal to $1 trillion. However, after 130 days, DOGE itself could only claim $160 billion in cuts, and independent observers question even that amount. Of its $160 billion, DOGE only itemized $61.5 billion and could provide documentation for only $32.5 billion. In other words, the whole thing was a scam. Using his own numbers, Musk was only able to achieve 12.5 percent of what he promised.

But those cuts add up to a total disaster. For no given reason, 120,000 federal employees were summarily fired and 120,000 families were forced to relocate or rebuild their lives. Services we depend on from FEMA, FAA, the National Weather Service, the National Park Service and the US Forest Service have been slashed. Critical research at NIH, FDA and most universities has been canceled, creating a brain drain of American scientists looking for job opportunities abroad.

Worse yet, no matter how much Musk and Trump deny it, many lives have been lost. According to Boston University, shutting down USAID and ending President Bush’s PEPFAR program alone has already resulted in 40,000 adult HIV deaths and more than 4,000 infant HIV deaths. Those numbers are expected to reach 159,300 adults and 16,954 infants by the end of the year. As philanthropist Bill Gates noted, “The picture of the world’s richest man killing the world’s poorest children is not a pretty one.”

Now, suddenly, Elon Musk has had an epiphany. He wants us to hail him as a voice of reason. No longer at Trump’s side, he’s turned on him, denounced his “one, big, beautiful, bill” as a “disgusting abomination” and urged Congress to kill it.

Forget about it. Yes, Musk’s right about the bill, but remember: There would be no Donald Trump back in the White House, there would be no “one, big, beautiful, bill” without Elon’s $250 million. He’s as responsible for this abomination of a bill as Trump is.

It’s a relief to have Elon Musk out of the White House. Now if he would only shut up and disappear forever.

(Bill Press is host of The BillPressPod, and author of 10 books, including: “From the Left: My Life in the Crossfire.” His email address is: bill@billpress.com. Readers may also follow him on Twitter @billpresspod and on BlueSky @BillPress.bsky.social.)

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