Round 2: Trump vs Musk Has China Enthralled
- Editor OGN Daily
- Jul 3
- 2 min read
In early June, Trump and Musk played out their first hissy fit on social media, and now we are moving into round two of the bromance bust up.
The latest drama comes from Musk’s pledge to found a new political party, the America Party, if Trump’s sweeping tax and spending bill, which Musk described as “insane” passed the Senate this week (it did). Musk had already vowed to unseat lawmakers who backed Trump’s flagship piece of legislation, which is expected to increase US national debt by a whopping $3.3 trillion.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the world, hours after the bill passed the US Senate, the hashtag #MuskWantsToBuildAnAmericaParty went viral on Weibo, a Chinese social media platform, receiving more than 37m views. One comment summed up the mood on the platform: “Brother Musk, you’ve got over a billion people on our side backing you.”
Musk is widely venerated in China for his business acumen and technological achievements, and his popularity follows a well-established trend of Chinese audiences enthusiastically embracing US tech innovators. Walter Isaacson’s biography of Steve Jobs was a bestseller in China, as was his biography of Musk.
Perhaps surprisingly, the conversation has been allowed to flourish on China’s tightly controlled social media, suggesting that at least some censors are betting that the US political chaos could be no bad thing for China.
Whilst there is yet to be a slew of slanging-match social media posts between Trump and Musk - and entertaining comments in the twitter-sphere about them - you may like to enjoy a chuckle or two by revisiting Funny Tweets About The Elon And Donald Hissy Fit that OGN published in early June.
