Elon Musk’s highly anticipated event with former President Donald Trump was postponed on Monday due to technical issues. Users of Musk’s social media platform X reported technical difficulties accessing the conversation, leading to the delay. The tech billionaire and the ex-president had planned to hold a live audio discussion on the platform, but technical problems forced them to reschedule.

It started approximately 40 minutes after its planned start time of 8 p.m. ET because some users needed help to gain access. The conversation mostly consisted of Trump’s monologue, akin to Trump’s campaign, with Musk interjecting with lighthearted questions about topics both men find agreeable. 

Despite declaring at last month’s Republican convention that he would only tell the story once, Trump recounted his near-death experience during a political rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. He indicated he would return to Butler in October.

They bonded over their shared belief that high immigration rates could threaten the legitimacy of the United States as a nation.

Discussions in The Trump-Musk Interview

Trump repeated widely debunked claims, including the assertion that violent criminals from “the Congo,” which he misleadingly referred to as a non-existent single country, had been transferred to U.S. prisons. This statement has been refuted by both the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Republic of Congo, with no evidence supporting such claims.

Musk, the CEO of Tesla, attempted to persuade Trump to take action against climate change and abandon fossil fuels. Still, it didn’t seem to have much effect because Trump declared that energy innovation was “not my world.”

Similar technical difficulties occurred in May 2023 when Florida Governor Ron DeSantis started his Republican presidential campaign on X and experienced continuous disruptions due to the site’s servers reportedly being unable to handle the increase in traffic. 

After a while, the audio-only conversation started and went on for over two hours. According to X’s public count, it had over 1.3 million audiences at its height.

After that, Trump shifted the conversation to his customary anti-immigration policy and issued a warning about the “rough people” who were trying to cross the border from Mexico into the US.

“These are individuals who are imprisoned for homicide and various offences, and they are being released into our nation,” stated Trump. 

Numerous studies have found no connection between immigration and increased crime rates. 

Trump’s Criticism and Harris’s Resilience in the Face of Project 2025

Trump disparaged Kamala Harris by labelling her the “border tsar” of Biden’s administration. However, both immigration law critics and Democratic officials challenge Trump’s characterisation of Harris’s record.

He mocked Harris, claiming she “destroyed” California as attorney general and senator. Trump oddly praised Harris’s appearance on the Time magazine cover. Even though it was only a sketch, he compared her to his wife, Melania.

Trump remarked, “She appears to be the most gorgeous actress to have ever lived.” “It was a sketch, and she did resemble Melania, the first lady, quite a bit.”

The Harris campaign criticized the interview, describing it as a clear example of Trump’s “dangerous Project 2025 agenda and extreme views.”

Campaign spokesperson Joseph Costello added, “Trump’s entire election campaign caters to people like himself and Elon Musk—self-obsessed wealthy individuals who will abandon the middle class and those unable to lead in the year 2024.”

Harris Polling Survey

The interview was conducted when Harris’s campaign launch last month saw her surge by 0.3% ahead in the polls.

Before Trump’s withdrawal from the race, Biden had a 3.3% lead over Harris, according to the Hill’s national polling average and the Decision Desk HQ.

Harris is even stronger in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, the states where the November election results are expected to be decided.

Harris now leads by four points in those three states, according to a recent set of polls released last week by Siena College and the New York Times. Previous polls in those states indicated a virtual tie or a slight Trump advantage.

Trump seems unsettled by the Democrats’ momentum, and his rally has found it difficult to label Harris as her popularity has increased over the last month. 

On Monday, Trump continued his attacks on Democratic incumbent Joe Biden, calling him “the worst president in history” and giving the impression that he was eager to challenge the former senator in the upcoming election.

Technical Difficulties: A Postponed Launch

Musk attributed the early technical issues to a “massive DDOS attack on X,” where hostile users attempt to overwhelm a system with a distributed denial of service attack. However, he did not provide any evidence to support this claim. NBC News was unable to verify Musk’s assertion.

According to a specialist in volumetric DDoS attacks—the most prevalent kind of denial of service DDoS attacks simply involve directing a large amount of fraudulent traffic toward a computer network. 

A scan of recent internet traffic revealed no indications of an attack targeting X, and the network appeared to be operating normally otherwise. Because they were afraid of reprisals, the expert requested secrecy.

Some users of X stated that they thought X’s technological capabilities, not an attack, were the issue. At one point, app users posted in frustration over their lack of attending the event, and the word “crashed” appeared on X’s trending list about the software.

Scammers were exploiting the moment as users struggled to join. A fraudulent Tesla YouTube account streamed a live feed of what seemed to be a modified video of Musk requesting that viewers scan a QR code to “double” their Bitcoin. Numerous crypto scams employ similar strategies in an attempt to steal Bitcoin.

Trump’s Return on X

Musk treated Trump with admiration and remained unfazed throughout the interview. Musk even suggested that he could serve on a “government efficiency commission” under Trump’s future administration.

There has been some history of discord between Trump and Musk. Despite claiming to have supported Biden in the 2020 election, Musk backed Trump last month following the abortive attempt on his life. 

The Wall Street Journal reports that Musk wants to register 800,000 Trump supporters in battleground states. 

The occasion revealed the extent of Trump and Musk’s reunion following years of fluctuation in their partnership. Although the two men had at least one private meeting this year in Palm Beach, Florida, it was their first partnership public event since Trump took office. 

As one of the richest persons in the world, Musk endorsed Trump last month for a second term in office. He has also contributed to a political committee to increase voter turnout ahead of the election on November 5.

Additionally, in 2022, Musk restored Trump’s X account, suspended from the platform after the January 6 threat on the US Capitol. 

Since then, Trump has mostly posted on his social media network, Truth Social, rather than using his account. However, he published several tweets promoting his campaign and labelling Harris as a “San Francisco Radical” hours just before the interview on Monday.

One major concern surrounding the Trump-Musk partnership has been the fate of federal subsidies for electric cars, such as Tesla models. 

Trump has decried government initiatives to increase electrification despite Tesla receiving billions of dollars in regulatory credits annually.

On Monday, Trump drew attention to their differences by telling Musk that while his product is fantastic, not everyone should own electric vehicles.

Final Thoughts

The conversation between Elon Musk and Donald Trump represents the power dynamics between two powerful people. It was filled with banters and serious political discussions.

They discussed immigration, climate change, and political strategies, regardless of the technical difficulties that delayed the event. 

Musk focused on energy innovation and climate change to bring attention to our long-term difficulties. Simultaneously, Trump shifted his focus to immigration and political rivals, highlighting his brief attention span for electoral issues.