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As much as former President Donald Trump would like Tesla TSLA and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk to join his potential cabinet, he’s probably just too busy.
“He wants to be involved. Now look, he’s running big businesses and all that, so he can’t, really, I don’t think he could be cabinet,” Trump told Shawn Ryan, a former Navy SEAL and podcaster, in an excerpt of an interview set to publish Monday. “I’d put him in the cabinet, absolutely, but I don’t know how he could do that with all the things he’s got going.”
Besides his electric vehicle company and aerospace company — the latter of which is planning to send billionaire Jared Isaacman on the first-ever private spacewalk on Tuesday — Musk leads a handful of other firms. That includes artificial intelligence startup xAI, which is intended to compete with OpenAI, brain chip startup Neuralink, tunneling firm The Boring Company, and the social media company X. His nonprofit, the Foundation, is also accepting applications for a private school in Texas.
There’s also the sheer difficulty of ensuring there would be no conflicts of interest between people who hold public office, their personal finances, and the companies they’re involved with. Any move by Musk to put his stock in a blind trust or divest would likely wreck havoc on Tesla’s TSLA share price, which is highly dependent on his involvement in the firm.
Despite those responsibilities, Musk has offered himself up for a job in a second Trump White House. Last week, he supported the idea of leading a possible Department of Government Efficiency. The acronym, of course, would be DOGE, the name of his favorite meme-based cryptocurrency,
And for his part, Trump told Ryan he could see Musk taking an advisory role, potentially focused on ramping up U.S. competitiveness on AI.
“He can sort of, as the expression goes, consult with the country and give you some very good ideas,” Trump said, before touting Musk’s AI expertise. Besides helping start both xAI and OpenAI, Musk has repeatedly called Tesla an AI company as it focuses on self-driving vehicles and robots.
The two men have have reportedly gotten closer over the past several months, often discussing matters like the U.S. Space Force and immigration. Bloomberg News in May reported that Musk has has counseled Trump on cryptocurrency policy and could be given a job advising Trump on the issue.
Musk has also formally endorsed Trump’s presidential bid and launched the super PAC America PAC to aid his efforts. The group is being investigated by authorities in Michigan and North Carolina over its practices, CNBC reports.
Musk in 2017 resigned from his spot on Trump’s White House advisory councils after the then-president withdrew from the Paris climate agreement, calling the move “not good for America or the world.” In an interview with Trump earlier this month, Musk said climate change wasn’t an issue that needed immediate attention and walked back his earlier, harsher comments on the oil and gas industry.