EXPLAINER: Elon Musk for United States president? Why that CANNOT happen

Could Elon Musk, who holds major sway in US President Donald Trump administration, one day become president?

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Trump answered that question recently with a resounding NO, pointing to US rules about being born in the country.

“He’s not gonna be president, that I can tell you,” Trump said.

“You know why he can’t be? He wasn’t born in this country,” Trump said of the Tesla and SpaceX boss, who was born in Pretoria in South Africa.

The US Constitution requires that a president be a natural-born US citizen.

Responding to criticism

Trump was responding to criticism, particularly from the Democratic camp, portraying the tech billionaire and world’s richest person as “President Musk” for the outsized role he is playing in his administration.

As per ceding the presidency to Musk, Trump also assured the crowd: “No, no that’s not happening.”

As reported by The South African website, US President Donald Trump painted Elon Musk as his enforcer-in-chief on Tuesday, hailing the tech billionaire’s zeal in implementing the blizzard of executive orders the president has issued since returning to office.

In a joint interview broadcast on Fox News, the two men spent substantial time singing the other’s praises and dismissing concerns that Trump is overstepping his executive powers.

Trump has signed scores of executive directives in the past three weeks, many of which have been challenged in the courts as potentially unconstitutional.

South Africa-born billionaire Elon Musk, who was Trump’s top donor during his 2024 presidential campaign, was tasked with leading the newly-created Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), with the declared goal of rooting out “waste, fraud and abuse” in federal spending.

“One of the biggest functions of the DOGE team is just making sure that the presidential executive orders are actually carried out,” Musk told Fox News.

In the interview, Trump insisted his policies – including a wholesale onslaught on federal institutions – should be implemented without delay and said Musk was instrumental in pushing them forward.

“You write an executive order and you think it’s done, you send it out, it doesn’t get done. It doesn’t get implemented,” Trump said.

He added that Elon Musk and the DOGE team have now become an enforcement mechanism within the federal bureaucracy to enact his administration’s agenda without anyone standing in their way – or else risk losing their jobs.

“And some guy that maybe didn’t want to do it, all of a sudden, he’s signing it,” Trump said.

‘The will of the people’

The Fox interview was broadcast just hours after Trump signed a sweeping executive order that sought to extend and consolidate direct White House control over federal regulatory agencies.

The order, which is likely to face legal challenges, would force agencies like the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to submit regulatory proposals to the White House for review.

“For the Federal Government to be truly accountable to the American people, officials who wield vast executive power must be supervised and controlled by the people’s elected President,” the executive order states.

Elon Musk found humour in his role as Trump’s executor, describing himself as a “technologist” and donning a T-shirt that read “Tech Support” for the interview.

Musk waved off criticism that he was acting as if he were the US president, saying none of Trump’s cabinet members were elected and that he views his role as facilitating Trump’s agenda.

“The president is the elected representative of the people, so it’s representing the will of the people,” Musk explained.

“And if the bureaucracy is fighting the will of the people and preventing the president from implementing what the people want, then what we live in is a bureaucracy and not a democracy.”

President Elon Musk?

Musk’s prominent role in the Trump administration has led to public questioning of who is really in charge at the White House, though the Republican leader was quick to dismiss rumors of bad blood between the two.

“Actually, Elon called me,” Trump said.

“He said, ‘You know, they’re trying to drive us apart.’ I said, ‘Absolutely.’”

But Trump expressed confidence that Americans will not be fooled by alleged efforts to strain ties between him and Musk.

“I used to think they were good at it,” Trump said, referring to the media.

“They’re actually bad at it, because if they were good at it, I’d never be president.”

“The people are smart,” he went on.

“They get it.”

Is it a good – or bad – thing that Elon Musk won’t ever be United States president?

Let us know by leaving a comment below, or send a WhatsApp to 060 011 021 1

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