Elon Musk. Photo: Getty Images
Elon Musk’s time in the White House could soon be coming to an end. President Donald Trump has reportedly told members of his inner circle that Musk will be stepping back “in the coming weeks” from his role at DOGE as a special government employee, according to Politico.
The report says both Trump and Musk agreed that the time is near for Musk to return his focus to Tesla, which has seen its stock drop more than 25 percent this year. (News of Musk’s possible return as a full-time CEO sent the stock up 5 percent in midday trading Wednesday.)
It also comes as Musk’s political influence appears to be waning. Democrats won a Wisconsin Supreme Court race Tuesday, despite Musk contributing heavily to the Republican candidate (an estimated $25 million), handing out $1 million checks to voters, and posting about the election heavily on social media. “This Wisconsin Supreme Court race might decide the future of America and Western Civilization!” he said days ago. His poll numbers, meanwhile, reflect a growing dislike of his cost-cutting methods.
Should Musk leave government service in the near future, though, it would be a stark reversal from early March, when Trump and his team were looking for ways to extend Musk’s stay beyond the mandated 130-day time limit he faced as a special government employee. That time limit will be hit in late May or early June, and Politico reports his transition away from the White House is likely to correspond with that.
Even if he departs from his day-to-day duties at the White House, Musk is likely to retain substantial political influence and will likely still serve in an advisory role and remain a big party contributor.
The White House has not commented on the report, but yesterday, in remarks during an executive order signing ceremony, Trump said of Musk, “I think he’s amazing, but I also think he’s got a big company to run and so at some point he’s going to be going back. He wants to.”
The longer Musk has stayed in the White House and made very public, controversial comments and decisions, the greater the impact has been on Tesla. The company’s dealerships have been a focal point of government protests. And Tesla showrooms and vehicles have faced a recent wave of vandalism. At one point, a doxing site even claimed to highlight the location of Tesla owners, dealerships, and Superchargers as well as listing personal information for members of the DOGE team.
On Wednesday, Tesla announced first quarter delivery numbers of 337,000 vehicles, a number that was well below analyst expectations and a 13 percent drop from a year ago. Wedbush analyst Dan Ives called it a “disaster,” adding the time had come for Musk to decide if he wanted to focus on politics or running a company.
“The time has come for Musk,” he wrote in a note to investors. “It’s a fork in the road moment. The more political he gets with DOGE, the more the brand suffers, there is no debate. This quarter was an example of the damage Musk is causing Tesla. … Musk needs to get his act together or else unfortunately darker times are ahead for Tesla.”
Musk returning won’t solve all of the company’s problems, though. There’s a lingering question of how permanent the brand damage he has created through his work at DOGE will be. (Bud Light, for example, has yet to recover from the boycott it faced two years ago.) In addition, some of the tailwinds that were helping Tesla before, like subsidies for buyers and the White House urging people to buy an electric vehicle, have disappeared.
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