President Trump’s senior adviser Peter Navarro insisted everything was ‘great’ with billionaire Elon Musk after the pair had a nasty tariff spat last week.
The top White House official dismissed questions about the brutal social media post by the world’s wealthiest person on Sunday after Musk publicly called him ‘dumber than a sack of bricks’ and a ‘moron.’
‘First of all, Elon and I are great. It’s not an issue,’ Navarro told host Kristen Welker.
When Welker pointed out that Musk had attacked Navarro as a ‘moron’ to his millions of followers on X, the close Trump ally shrugged it off with a laugh.
‘I’ve been called worse. Everything’s fine with Elon,’ he said.
Navarro even went on to praise Musk for his work with DOGE.
‘Elon is doing a very good job with his team with waste, fraud and abuse. That’s a tremendous contribution to America,’ he added.
But their savage back and forth this past week suggested they were anything but ‘fine.’
Trump’s trade adviser Peter Navarro insisted he and Elon Musk are great and said he has been called ‘worse’ after the tech billionaire last week called him ‘dumber than a sack of bricks’ in a heated spat over tariffs
The extraordinary row between Musk and Navarro escalated as members of Trump’s inner circle have split over how the administration has been handling trade policy.
The SpaceX and Tesla billionaire frequently criticized the sweeping tariffs announced by the president earlier this month on imports from around the world.
Musk has personally lost billions as the markets responded turbulently to Trump’s widespread tariffs and escalating trade war with China.
But their spat took a jaw-dropping turn last week after Navarro criticized Tesla.
The top Trump adviser described Musk as a ‘car assembler’ and claimed his Tesla vehicles required parts manufactured in foreign countries including China, Japan, and Taiwan.
‘When it comes to tariffs and trade, we all understand in the White House, and the American people understand, that Elon is a car manufacturer, but he’s not a car manufacturer. He’s a car assembler,’ Navarro said in an interview last week.
Musk fired back on X: ‘Navarro is dumber than a sack of bricks‘ and called him ‘truly a moron.’
He even dubbed the trade adviser as ‘Peter Retarrdo.’
President Trump seated next to Elon Musk at the UFC fight in Miami on Saturday night
Billionaire chief executive of Tesla Elon Musk savaged President Donald Trump’s trade advisor Peter Navarro after he criticized the DOGE advisor’s car company. Pictured (left): Peter Navarro, Stephen Miller and Elon Musk speaking inside the Oval Office of the White House in March. Pictured (right): Trump and Musk in the Oval Office on March 14
But despite the hostilities playing out in public online, the White House dismissed the feud last week.
Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt even brushed it off at her press briefing with ‘boys will be boys’ and said the administration planned to let the public sparring continue while touting what she claimed is the ‘most transparent administration in history.’
When asked about a report last week that Navarro had been sidelined by Trump, he pushed back in the NBC interview on Sunday, pointing out ‘I’m here.’
Navarro is not the first person Musk as feuded with as he runs DOGE and remains an ever-present person in Trump’s second administration.
Last month, ‘first buddy’ also clashed with Secretary of State Marco Rubio according to a brutal New York Times report before they put up a public united front.
