Saturday 31 / May / 2025
Washington DC: US President Donald Trump is set to bid farewell to his billionaire adviser Elon Musk with a press event in the Oval Office later on Friday.
"This will be his last day, but not really, because he will, always, be with us, helping all the way," Trump said in a post on his Truth Social media platform on Thursday.
"Elon is terrific! See you tomorrow at the White House," Trump said.
Musk has been heading up the Department of Government Efficiency or DOGE that has been behind the drastic federal workforce cuts.
Over a month ago, Musk indicated that from May onwards, he would be spending "significantly" less time working as Trump's cost-cutter and focus on his e-car company Tesla, which has posted plunging sales figures.
Musk claimed that DOGE had saved taxpayers $160 billion although the numbers have been questioned, with some suggesting that some savings had been double-counted.
It hasn't been a smooth 130 days in Washington, with Elaine Kamarck of the Brookings Institution telling AFP news agency the beginning of the end "started (in) mid-March when there were several meetings in the Oval Office and in the cabinet room where basically Elon Musk got into fights."
Musk publicly called Trump's trade adviser Peter Navarro "dumber than a sack of bricks."
As indicated by Trump in his social media post, this doesn't appear to be the end of things.
"I think they genuinely like each other and I think Musk has a lot of money that he can contribute to campaigns if he is so moved. I think there will be a continued relation," Kamarck told AFP.
