House Speaker Mike Johnson sent Elon Musk a “long text message” after clips from his CBS interview were released showing the former face of the Department of Government Efficiency criticizing the House GOP’s “big, beautiful bill.”
“I was, like, disappointed to see the massive spending bill, frankly, which increases the budget deficit, not just decreases it, and it undermines the work that the DOGE team is doing,” Musk said.
"I think a bill can be big or it can be beautiful," he continued, "but I don't know if it can be both. My personal opinion."
Asked on Fox News how he responded to Musk’s concerns, Johnson said he told his “good friend” that the bill can indeed be “both big and beautiful.”
“So, what I wanted to make sure that he understands is that the projection that he’s referring to and others is from the CBO, the Congressional Budget Office,” Johnson explained. “They are historically totally unreliable. It’s run by Democrats, 84 percent of the number crunchers over there are donors to big Democrats.
“They don’t have our best interest in mind,” the Louisiana Republican continued. “And they’ve always been off. By way of example, they were off on their projections of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act in the first Trump administration by $1 trillion dollars. The problem is they do not use what we call dynamic scoring. What that means in layman’s terms is, they don’t give us any credit for the extraordinary economic growth that will be spurred along by this bill. This is a pro-growth package. Lower tax rates, less regulation. We’ll do exactly what we did in the first Trump administration, but this time on steroids.”
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Speaker Mike Johnson to @elonmusk: Bill Can Be Both Big and Beautiful
— Mr Producer (@RichSementa) May 29, 2025
“I sent my good friend Elon a long text message last night explaining that it can be both big and beautiful, OK? So, what I wanted to make sure that he understands is that the projection that he’s referring to… https://t.co/qr9IIp8ApF pic.twitter.com/l7DawNEl78
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