Perturbed and greatly annoyed by the Democrats' switcheroo from President Joe Biden to Vice President Kamala Harris, and the latter's seemingly meteoric rise in the polls (with an additional bump after picking Gov. Tim Walz as her running mate), GOP presidential nominee and former POTUS Donald Trump is eager to get some of his lost mojo back, which is why he dedicated Monday night for an interview with X owner (and apparently avid fan) Elon Musk.
Right off the bat, the interview didn't start as smoothly as a Trump supporter would have hoped. Technical issues, which Musk described as a "massive DDOS attack on 𝕏", delayed the beginning of the interview by about 40 minutes.
Musk began by inquiring about the assassination attempt against Trump at a Pennsylvania rally in mid-July. While Trump spoke about it at unreasonable length, he began by saying: "I didn't know I had that much blood. The doctors later told me that the ear is a place that is a very bloody place if you're gonna get hit. But in this case, it was probably the best alternative you could even think about because it went at the right angle. And it was a hard hit. It was very, I guess you would say surreal, but it wasn't surreal. You know, I was telling somebody, you have instances like this or like a lot less than this where you feel it's a surreal situation."
Musk referred to the moment Trump raised his fist in defiance right after the shots were fired. "I think your actions in the heat of fire, and, you know, like what I find admirable there was that you can't fake bravery under such circumstances. The courage is instinctual or it is not. It's not a rehearsed action," Musk fawned.
Trump went on to speak about illegal immigration in a tone reminiscent of his "They're bringing drugs, they're bringing crime" speech about undocumented immigrants and asylum seekers coming through the southern border eight years ago. "We had things where if people, many people come in there, they have contagious diseases. We had everything passed. If you have a contagious disease, I'm sorry, but we cannot allow you into the country. So we were setting literally records," he said.
Pivoting to attack the Biden administration about the issue, which Musk described as "World War Z zombie apocalypse," Trump railed against supposedly "record-breaking" numbers of people coming in: "These people are fake. Now they're also saying they did a good job on the border. We had the worst numbers in the history of the world, not of our country. There's never been a country in history that has had a catastrophe like this. We've had, I believe, and I think you believe this too. You know, you hear 12 million, 13. I believe it's over 20 million people came into our country. Many coming from jails, from prisons, from mental institutions, or a bigger version of that is insane asylums. And many are terrorists."
'Coming from countries that are bombing Israel'
That's when Trump somehow linked the situation on the southern border to the attacks of October 7: "They're coming from Asia. They're coming from the Middle East. They're coming from countries that are stupidly and horribly bombing Israel, October 7th. They're coming from all over the world. And you know, you look at, it's so sad, October 7th, because it should have never happened. It's so sad when you look at Ukraine. It should have never happened. We have a defective government. These are defective people, and they're not people that should be running it."
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Trump said if he were president, Iran would not be attacking and relationship with Russia would be better
(Photo: Creative Commons BY)
Bungling his geography and further providing ammunition for Democrats who claim he is ignorant, Trump railed against immigration, misplacing countries from central America as "south": "You know, we think of South America, we think of Honduras and El Salvador, Guatemala and Mexico, you know, the four."
Switching candidates from Biden to Harris 'was a coup'
While seemingly speaking about several unrelated issues at once, Trump ranted against the Democratic party's transition from President Biden to Vice President Harris as its nominee for the 2024 elections. "What I can tell you is this, we cannot have a Democrat. We cannot have her. She's incompetent. She's as bad as Biden in a different way. Look, he hasn't done an interview since this whole scam started. And say what you want. This was a coup. This was a coup of a president of the United States. He didn't wanna leave. And they said, we can do it the nice way, or we can do it the hard way."
Musk reaffirmed Trump's rant by adding: "They just took him out back behind the shed and basically shot him."
'Putin respected me'
From there, Trump transitioned to discussing foreign leaders, reaffirming his inexplicable adoration for Russian President Vladimir Putin: "But I know Putin very well. I got along with him very well. He respected me. And it's just one of those things. And we would talk a lot about Ukraine. It was the apple of his eye. But I said, don't ever do it. Don't ever do it. I shut down Nord Stream, that was the big oil pipeline. The biggest, I think the biggest pipeline in the world going all over Europe. I shut it down. Biden came and then they say, I loved Russia. I was a friend of Putin and I loved Russia No, he actually said to me one time, he said, if you're my friend, I'd hate to see you as an enemy."
Israel is 'waiting for attack from Iran'
Attributing Iran's inaction toward Israel when he was in office to his supposedly strong leadership, Trump said: "All this stuff that you're seeing now, all the horror that you, look at Israel. They're all waiting for an attack from Iran. Iran would not be attacking, believe me. You know, when I was there, and I say it with respect, because I think we would have been good with Iran. I don't wanna do anything bad to Iran, but they knew not to mess around. Iran was broke, because I told China, if you buy from Iran oil, it's all about the oil. That's where the money is. But if you buy oil from Iran, you're not gonna do any business with the United States."
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Vice President Kamala Harris was absent from Netanyahu's speech to congress, Trump: 'Disrespectful'
(Photo: Harris for President campaign)
Inflation and economics
Veering from geopolitical concerns to domestic ones, Trump attacked the Biden administration over the economy. "The election's coming up and the people wanna hear about the economy and the fact that they can't buy groceries because they don't have enough money to buy groceries. The inflation has killed them. Food prices are up 50, 60, even 100% in some cases. And this stupid administration allowed this to happen. And it's a shame. And that's the thing that people most care about, in my opinion," Trump said.
"It's a disaster with inflation. The inflation, it doesn't matter what you make. The inflation has eaten you alive. If you're a worker or if you're just a middle income person, you can't afford, you know, four years ago, five years ago, people were saving a lot of money. Today, they're using all their money and borrowing money just to live. It's a horrible thing that's happening. And we'll end that quickly.
"We have to bring energy prices down. Energy started at the price of gasoline. Now, your cars don't require too much gasoline, so you have a good, and you do make a great product, I have to say, I have to be honest with you. That doesn't mean everybody should have an electric car, but these are minor details. But your product is incredible But the gasoline, Elon, is the cost of energy. Not only gasoline, it's the cost of heating your house and cooling your house. That has to come down. It's gone up 100%, 150, and 200%, and that has to come down."
A Jew who votes for Harris 'ought to have their head examined'
Later in the interview, Musk spoke of Netanyahu's recent speech to Congress and the fact that Harris did not attend. "Netanyahu came to give a talk to a joint Senate and House meeting, and I was there and Kamala stood him up. You know, what does that say?"
To which Trump replied: "I think it's highly disrespectful. And I say, if you're a Jewish person or if you believe in Israel, if you're a person that is very pro-Israel, if you vote for her, it's worse than Biden. And Biden was bad. But if you vote for her, you ought to have your head examined. And you see tonight, I mean, as we're doing this, I'm seeing reports coming that they expect an attack tonight or tomorrow from hundreds and maybe thousands of rockets. You know, their Iron Dome, as they call it, as we all call it, but their shield that they built, that can be swamped."
Tim Walz is an 'anti-Israel radical'
Mentioning Harris' pick for vice president, Trump railed against the Minnesota governor: "A lot of people thought she'd pick sort of the opposite, but she picked an anti-Israel radical left person, but she is far worse, they say, than Bernie Sanders. If we have her as a president, if we have a Democrat at this moment as the president, I don't think our country can survive."