‘Elon and I are great’: Peter Navarro denies spat with Musk regardless of public feuding on tariffs | EUROtoday

One of Donald Trump’s high commerce officers, Peter Navarro, denied a blow-up in his relationship with Elon Musk on Sunday after the Twitter and DOGE baron insulted him in a number of tweets.

Navarro appeared Sunday on NBC’s Meet the Press as he and different administration officers mentioned the continued rollout of the president’s chaotic tariff technique and the frequent walk-backs of commerce coverage from the White House.

Speaking with Kristen Welker, he claimed that “everything’s fine with Elon” and denied taking offense at being known as a “moron” by the billionaire tech CEO.

“Elon is doing a very good job with his team with waste, fraud and abuse,” mentioned Navarro, including: “Elon and I are agreeing. It’s not an issue.”

Musk opened up a broadside in opposition to Navarro this previous week. In feedback and replies on Twitter, he known as Navarro “dumber than a sack of bricks” and a “moron”, whereas mockingly calling the primary time period an insult to bricks. The Tesla CEO was incensed over Navarro, in a CNBC interview, claiming that enormous percentages of Teslas and Cybertrucks are assembled in America from elements manufactured abroad.

“Navarro is truly a moron. What he says here is demonstrably false,” Musk wrote in a single reply to a clip of that interview.

Smiling, Navarro mentioned on Sunday: “I’ve been called worse.”

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White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt tried to dismiss the battle in feedback to reporters over the week, quipping, “boys will be boys,” however the total nature of Musk’s feedback allude to continued disagreement throughout the White House and Donald Trump’s broader circle of advisers concerning the style and scope of his tariffs and the velocity at which they’ve been rolled out for the reason that starting of the yr.

Administration officers have been pushed on the defensive because of criticism from each Democrats and Republicans over the wishy-washy nature of the tariff bulletins up up to now. At numerous factors the president has carried out and known as off tariffs in opposition to Canada, Mexico, and different international locations whereas this month implementing across-the-board tariffs of 10 p.c on most US imports.

He’s additionally focused particular person international locations with so-called “reciprocal” tariffs, although in a single case doing so in opposition to an uninhabited pair of rocks within the Pacific Ocean.

Markets, involved with the general results of Trump’s tariffs and the uncertainty surrounding his seriousness, slid over the previous two weeks pushed by losses in tech shares and different sectors immediately affected by the tariff insurance policies. The president responded immediately, first by implementing a 90-day pause for his so-called “reciprocal” tariffs and on Friday by transferring once more to specify {that a} host of tech-related imports together with smartphones could be exempt from each units of tariffs. Officials mentioned Sunday that that is momentary, however have been unable to definitively say whether or not the tariffs themselves are merely a negotiation tactic or are supposed for the long run.

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Navarro’s conflict with Musk units up an attention-grabbing energy dynamic within the White House given Musk’s outpouring of monetary help for the GOP whereas he concurrently turns into an more and more unpopular political determine, because of the chaos of his DOGE-related cuts to federal businesses and bankrolling of Republican causes. Musk’s monetary means are considered a significant factor conserving him in Trump and the GOP’s good graces, significantly given the president’s long-held need to win the help of enterprise leaders.

His counterpart, in the meantime, is one of some White House insiders (like Stephen Miller) who survived everything of the president’s first time period and even had the excellence of putting up with a jail sentence after refusing to cooperate with the congressional investigation into January 6. His loyalty to Trump is matched by few, and the president has stored him shut.