Featured Image Credit: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
Topics: Elon Musk, Donald Trump, Politics, US News
Madison Burgess
Topics: Elon Musk, Donald Trump, Politics, US News
This morning, the news broke of one of the biggest ‘break-ups’ of the year - no, not Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck - Elon Musk and Donald Trump.
The US president’s right-hand man resigned from the Republican administration after his temporary role came to an end.
It comes five months after Musk was made one of Trump's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) co-leads. Branded as a ‘special government employee,’ he was allowed to work a federal job for 130 days each year.
The role handed him the responsibility of cutting excessive spending by the federal government, but the White House began 'offboarding' the tech boss on Wednesday night, according to the BBC.
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During his time in the role, the Tesla CEO came under fire for brutally axing thousands of government and civil positions with support of the president.
To announce his departure, he wrote on Twitter: ‘"As my scheduled time as a Special Government Employee comes to an end, I would like to thank President @realDonaldTrump for the opportunity to reduce wasteful spending.
"The @DOGE mission will only strengthen over time as it becomes a way of life throughout the government."
And now, the eye-watering sum that billionaire Musk lost during his 130-day stint has been revealed.
According to reports, Musk has parted with a staggering $53,000,000,000.
In late January, his net worth was $439,000,000,000, according to the Bloomberg Billionaire’s Index.
And now the publication reports that it sits at a slightly less $386,000,000,000 meaning he lost over $50billion.
In the hours that followed Musk’s resignation, the billionaire alluded to the fact that his 'break up' from Trump was actually rather bitter, hinting in a retweet that the two had endured tensions for some time by preempting negative publicity.
Musk reshared a message written by an account named @cb_doge, which read: "In the coming days, legacy media will try to convince you that President Trump and Elon Musk are no longer friends and that’s why Musk left."
The statement continued: "What they won’t tell you is that Elon was a Special Government Employee, limited to 130 days of service and that term ends tomorrow."
On top of this, Musk’s timely departure came just 24 hours after he admitted he was ‘disappointed’ by Trump’s backing of a bill.
The 'One Big Beautiful Bill Act' is expected to increase the deficit by $3.8 trillion by 2034, with Musk telling press that said legislation 'undermines the work' that his team 'is doing'.
It would extend the president's tax cuts and increase border security spending, among several other aims.
"I was disappointed to see the massive spending bill, frankly, which increases the budget deficit, not just decreases it, and undermines the work that the DOGE team is doing," Musk confessed on Tuesday during an interview with CBS.