Elon Musk Wants Credit for Cutting Waste, Not Cutting Aid

As the year draws to a close, we are bringing you one of Mishal Husain’s biggest conversations of the year, in full. In May 2025, Elon Musk joined Bloomberg's Qatar Economic Forum, in a rare media appearance.

He remains as consequential a global figure today, as he was then, even if he is no longer working with Donald Trump.

Within 10 days of this conversation, he had left DOGE, the Department of Government Efficiency, and soon after that he was publicly trading insults with the president.

Musk talked about Tesla, his ambitions for SpaceX and Starlink and his political spending.

Note: This episode was recorded with a remote guest in front of a live audience, and as a result, the audio quality may vary.

02:31 - Mishal Husain introduces Elon Musk
03:21 - A week in the life of Elon Musk
04:25 - The future of Tesla
9:19 - Attacks on Tesla showrooms
11:35 - The future of warfare
14:30 - “I’m in no rush to go public”
17:30 - OpenAI
20:45 - Regulating AI
24:00 - “I’m simply an advisor”
26:30 - Starlink
29:44 - “Your question’s absurd”
31:26 - DOGE
33:15 - US Agency for International Development
37:20 - Political spending

Watch this podcast here: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLe4PRejZgr0Ns_wjGlmjlPz0cded0nTYS

You can find the written version of this interview with Mishal’s notes on Bloomberg Weekend: https://www.bloomberg.com/latest/weekend-interview

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